r/gaming • u/ApofiSs-93 • 13d ago
At 140 Million Dollars the will smith game is a good example of money laundering.
8.3k
u/Exotic_Librarian_238 13d ago
Never heard of this game. They obviously didn't have proper ad campaign
5.3k
u/godita 13d ago
only reason i heard of it was because dunkey made fun of it lol
1.8k
u/AJfriedRICE 13d ago
Will Smith made one post about it on release day or something and then never mentioned it again. Even he or his team knew it was shit
937
u/PliableG0AT 13d ago
Even he or his team knew it was shit
lol not even. they knew that was all they had to do to get paid. who gives a shit beyond that.
419
u/Mort_Mortinson 12d ago
Believe it or not, I was apart of his team at the time of the pitch(albeit lower on the totem pole), and you are 100% correct. The amount of second hand cringe I felt in those meetings from their ideas was near catastrophic. The game almost didn’t happen. The frozen musical moment idea made me turn my camera off.
149
u/PeanutButterSoda 12d ago
frozen musical moment
The What? link?
→ More replies (1)253
u/BeneficialEvidence6 12d ago edited 12d ago
Search "videogamedunky will smith game" on Youtube
Edit: https://youtu.be/qQV6guvFmM0?si=9XZglGPJQw9LpaEJ
Starts around 2:40
123
u/TheWanderingSlacker 12d ago
Sorry, I have a habit of singing while on guard duty. It helps trespassers avoid me.
→ More replies (1)45
u/SycoJack 12d ago
That looks like a shitty fan remaster of a shitty fanfic total conversion mod of a PS2 game that was created by the guy that creates those shitty mobile game trailers.
20
14
u/amalgam_reynolds 12d ago
Omg I forgot about the best line in that video: "this ain't a video game...this is a product."
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (17)6
7
→ More replies (2)26
u/TJBurger 12d ago
Just to clarify, were you part of the team at the time of the pitch? Just asking because "a part" and "apart" mean opposite things.
→ More replies (9)34
u/legend8522 12d ago
The funniest thing is (at least from dunkey’s vid), will smith doesn’t even voice the character based off him. That character has zero voiced lines. The game just uses his likeness and that’s it
14
u/bundabrg 12d ago
There was a voiced line by that character but it's laughably not remotely like Will.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (1)34
→ More replies (6)127
74
23
→ More replies (10)27
u/DoomedTravelerofMoon 13d ago
I heard about it from Kevduit myself. Dunkey is good tho
→ More replies (1)198
u/lain_clancey 13d ago
Besides the game itself is really mediocre, boring and poorly designed at times.
106
u/Calm-Bid-5759 13d ago
I think it slaps
→ More replies (2)205
220
u/Realseetras 13d ago
Yeah, for a game with such a famous figurehead and overall budget, you'd think they would have spent more on an attempt at marketing.
316
u/kshell11724 13d ago
Thats the funny part is he litterally is just a figurehead in it. It's just his likeness that's in the game. Not his voice which is even more wtf on where all the money went.
→ More replies (1)138
u/Asleep-Fee-6503 13d ago
Wait. Will Smith doesn’t play himself in the game, am I understanding that correctly?
115
u/samusmaster64 13d ago
No, it's just a similar voice. They use his likeness, not him. It's to save money for the laundering part.
→ More replies (1)5
u/silentrawr 12d ago
I get the concept, but where's the money being laundered to/from?
→ More replies (13)11
u/CornDoggyStyle 12d ago
Aliens.
He's still paying off the lawsuit from beating that alien's ass in Indepenpedenpendence Day.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (1)41
u/GlassHalfSmashed 13d ago
Tbh has he done much since slapgate?
I wonder if they paid the money before all of that and since decided to reign in the affiliation a bit?
→ More replies (22)35
u/ArcadianDelSol 13d ago
He did an Underground Railroad movie thinking it would be an easy win. I dont think anyone ever saw it.
21
u/Mist_Rising 12d ago
Emancipation, which was filmed before Will slapped Rock.
He's also producing some remake film, Bel-Air, and a bad boys
→ More replies (2)6
u/Shit-Talker-Sr 12d ago
Say the movie, it was fairly good tbh, but all I could think of was "the slap" the entire movie
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (6)44
u/SacrificialSam 13d ago
Does anyone remember the game for PS1 that starred Bruce Willis called Apocalypse?
That game was fucking fun.
14
u/ATCQ_ 12d ago
Watched a play though of this recently, forgot how insane it was. I wish they'd make a sequel or something crazy
6
u/Snyder4430 12d ago
Since Bruce Willis signed his likeness away to an A.I. company, that very well could happen!
→ More replies (5)5
u/mortalcoil1 12d ago
PS1 also had the classic Die Hard Trilogy.
Also, there's the obvious Cyberpunk 2077.
89
u/apocalypse_later_ 13d ago
The main market for this was China I believe
26
u/Motivated79 12d ago
It was
13
u/tomdarch 12d ago
Oh. Then does anyone here have any idea how it did financially in that market?
27
u/AmbroseMalachai 12d ago
Not great. Apparently it brought in $1.4 million globally and $288k from Chinese Apple devices in March. Considering that doesn't include Hwahuei or Android sales - which I gotta assume had some sales - I can't really speculate on what it's overall revenue was; but it's a definite floppy flop.
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (6)12
37
u/Slap_My_Lasagna 12d ago
It's a Tencent mobile game. US/Western audiences were never the target.
→ More replies (3)→ More replies (16)28
3.1k
u/Scruffylookin13 13d ago
"The Zombie was standing up killing him, murdering him. It was murder in there"
Gameplay footage has been leaked. Apparently it isn't pretty.
594
u/Realseetras 13d ago edited 13d ago
The game has apparently already been released on Steam and mobile, since last summer. For a game with such a large budget and coming from a large company, it's quite odd that there seemingly was no marketing, and it kinda just flopped and fell under the radar.
177
u/Afkbio 13d ago
Nobody wants to be associated with this shitty game.
124
429
u/I_SuplexTrains 13d ago
Damn, was this written by Alan Wake himself?
146
u/Shack691 13d ago
Nah it doesn’t have Norse gods singing rock songs.
28
u/VinnehRoos 13d ago
Poets of the Fall is an amazing band though!
I swear at one point Spotify random music let me listen to the band Old Gods of Asgard and it took me about 15 seconds to recognise it was just Poets of the Fall but with a different name, purely for the Alan Wake game.
→ More replies (2)30
u/H-s-O 13d ago
Not just Alan Wake, Control too
10
u/VinnehRoos 12d ago
I've never played any of these games but from what I've picked up from reading a lot online, Control and Alan Wake are set in the same universe, right?
Might actually have to play these games some day, I fucking love Poets of the Fall and they might actually be the gateway for me to play these games XD
8
u/ZeroLivesRemain 12d ago
They are in the same universe. Definitely give them a go! AW2 also heavily implies Quantum Break is also canon, but bc of IP issues with MS, they can't out and say so.
→ More replies (2)7
u/TheSkiGeek 12d ago
Yeah, in Control they reference the events of Alan Wake as another anomaly. (And then they did a DLC mission related to it.) So it seems like a shared universe now.
53
u/thatlookslikemydog 13d ago
Getting Garth Marenghi vibes from this writing.
18
u/Sockoflegend 13d ago
I would play that game
17
u/daniflemp 13d ago
I'm right behind you 110%, that way I can back track 10%, but still completely agree with you.
10
10
→ More replies (2)81
u/TurtlePowerMutant 13d ago
Woah now, Alan Wake is a god.
46
u/omgFWTbear 13d ago
Some might say, a god that is dead yet dreaming, beyond the cold wastes of Control…
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (3)68
u/zehamberglar 12d ago
Gameplay footage has been leaked
How do you leak gameplay footage of a game that's been out for nearly a year?
→ More replies (1)
904
u/dragoduval PC 13d ago
DOes it still exist ? Was sure that it got closed after a week of release.
695
u/Realseetras 13d ago
This reuters article briefly mentions that it made $1.4 million in revenue globally in the month of January 2024. The game also appears to still be listed on Steam and the play store. So, I'd assume it's still existing.
These are pretty sad numbers for a game that had such a large budget.
→ More replies (3)264
u/ryry1237 13d ago
A return on investment of 1:100. You get back $1 for every $100 spent.
→ More replies (26)→ More replies (2)84
u/sckurvee 13d ago
It's free on steam. I wonder if you're think of that other game that got killed quickly... "the day before"?
27
u/Blue2487 13d ago
True. Wasn't undawn also the name of one of those awkward chinese zombie mobile games
→ More replies (1)24
310
u/Goldman250 13d ago
There’s a new Will Smith game?
259
u/Business-Plastic5278 13d ago
There is an old Will Smith game?
132
u/lexkixass 13d ago
There is a Will Smith game?
→ More replies (1)39
u/Who_is_John_Galt1 13d ago
There is a Will Smith?
→ More replies (2)32
→ More replies (4)11
10
u/TheRealestGayle 13d ago
Why would they give us this instead of a Wild Wild West game?
→ More replies (2)
759
u/Derek-The-Rad 13d ago
Can we slap the Zombies?
399
u/ApofiSs-93 13d ago
KEEP YOUR SLAPS OUT OF MY DAMN ZOMBIES
92
→ More replies (1)12
→ More replies (8)13
569
u/Accer_sc2 13d ago
Dunkey did a video on this and it does look pretty grim: https://youtu.be/qQV6guvFmM0?feature=shared
409
u/Iggyhopper 13d ago
Holy shit that is BAD. 140 million and Will is text only, no voice lines?
130
→ More replies (1)13
125
u/feedmeyourknowledge 13d ago
I remember where there was a time you couldn't go two weeks without dunkey being one of the top posts on one of the main subreddits here and you hardly ever see him mentioned now.
85
u/private_birb 13d ago
He hasn't been posting as much, and his videos are less ambitious this last year or two or so.
Seems a lot of his focus is going towards his family, and their publishing company, which I think is totally fair.
24
u/LemurKick 12d ago
He's actually been posting weekly or more for months now, but the videos are pretty low effort, to be honest. Not bad, but not super entertaining.
18
33
u/A_Ruse_ter 13d ago
I think part of it might be with him about to have a kid, maybe some of the publisher business with a game he’s working with
→ More replies (1)→ More replies (9)80
u/mightylordredbeard 13d ago edited 13d ago
Dunkey fell off.
Edit: man y’all really need to watch more Dunkey videos. Maybe that way when someone quotes one of his popular lines you won’t jump to defense mode.
39
5
u/imperfectluckk 12d ago
It might be a reference, but it's also just true.
Whether it's due to his kid, Big Mode, or something else, who can say - but the fact remains his videos certainly have suffered a loss in quality.
14
→ More replies (3)5
u/korblborp 12d ago
wow, that looks at least ten years old. and that poor nurse! although i praise the post-apocalyptic doctors who manged to keep her alive and sew her back together.
345
u/iskin 13d ago
They should make a $10 game where you're Will Smith and you go around slapping everyone at the Oscar's. Every year they can have a $5 celebrity addon dlc for all the newest celebs.
182
u/SuperSecretAnon-UwU 13d ago
A Will Smith slapping game would have 100% been a flash game you could find online if it happened during that time...but now we'll never know...
37
→ More replies (2)12
→ More replies (1)18
105
u/TheLizardKing89 12d ago
Reddit tries to understand money laundering challenge (impossible)
→ More replies (1)6
32
u/Rocketeer1019 Xbox 13d ago
Is this real?
→ More replies (1)99
u/ReyMorrison 12d ago edited 12d ago
Not really, it's just a generic mobile game that had a collaboration with Will Smith in China (like an event in any game) but the internet started calling it like it was his game for some reason, rumor after rumor we got here where people think it's actually a Will Smith PC game that failed and somehow OP added the money laundering thing.
Another recent example of China using famous people for mobile games is KennyS playing a mobile copy of Valorant, but that doesn't make it HIS game, same case as Undawn.
→ More replies (3)31
u/CORN___BREAD 12d ago
This post is a classic reddit moment. “This thing is money laundering” with no explanation as to why they think it’s money laundering but this is reddit and no one knows what money laundering is.
11,600 upvotes
→ More replies (3)
124
u/mangage 13d ago
i dont think you know how money laundering works
78
41
u/Z0MBIE2 12d ago
It really just kills me anytime people suggest something expensive was bad so it's intentional and money laundering, when just taking a second to think about it would prove otherwise.
→ More replies (4)11
u/BenevolentCheese 12d ago
Drug lords love making a high budget mobile game featuring Will Smith in order to clean some money.
→ More replies (13)11
86
13d ago
[deleted]
→ More replies (11)31
u/ddevilissolovely 12d ago
It's crazy how little sense it makes. The initial investment, or at least most of it, has to be clean money, so you're down $100M of clean fucking money just creating your scheme. Instead you could pay some developers to create a bunch of shitty indie games or other digital products for you, then get giftcards with cash to purchase them. Not efficient in the least but at least it could actually launder money.
10
8
u/Randym1982 13d ago edited 11d ago
Random musical number in a zombie survival game? Check. Bad voice acting? check. Terrible gameplay? Triple check.
59
u/_Hotwire_ 13d ago
Remember when Will was fun?
9
u/Pitiful-Climate8977 12d ago
Public opinion did a lot of heavy lifting for these old school celebrities, the social media age has crumbled the illusion of some and empowered others
→ More replies (15)6
u/HardcorePhonography 12d ago
Haha like when haha he laughs at his own haha jokes, haha I'm barely human haha.
132
u/DUSTIN182W 13d ago
Why? Do you have an article or what is your logic for claiming this?
109
u/dkyguy1995 13d ago
Redditors have no idea what money laundering is.
35
u/Deputy_Scrub 13d ago
You can add NDAs to that list
→ More replies (3)→ More replies (4)5
u/fakieTreFlip 12d ago
Now take this idea and apply it to most other topics on reddit and you'll get an understanding of just how unreliable things you read on this site tend to be
15
u/driverdan 12d ago
Because reddit is full of dumb kids who think every financial transaction they don't understand is money laundering.
→ More replies (1)10
u/WackyBones510 12d ago
Yeah isn’t it a digital game? That’s…. Not at all how money laundering works.
→ More replies (4)122
u/HugeHans 13d ago
Yeah people dont seem to know what money laundering is.
If you claim you have spent a ridiculous amount of money on something and took a huge loss then it can be tax evasion but it is quite opposite of money laundering.
Money laundering is when you show a huge income that you didnt actually make because you have dirty money that now can become clean.
→ More replies (51)10
u/SolomonBlack 12d ago
It's not even tax evasion if you actually spent it! The IRS doesn't require businesses spend their money intelligently, and it would be worse if they did because that's penalizing the losers for losing. Really its only tax evasion when you have a bunch of money you don't report.
And if you actually just pocketed it or IDK blew it all at the Turkish Bath that gets into just straight up fraud.
45
u/Fun-Jellyfish-61 12d ago
Something is expensive
Redditors: it must be money laundering
15
→ More replies (4)12
u/BaronMontesquieu 12d ago
If the game is so terrible then how would the money laundering work exactly?
Sink $140 million into the game and lose most of it? That's not money laundering, that's financial ineptitude.
6
u/Waste_Temporary_8281 13d ago
Never heard of the game, but who would be laundering what money through its production? If they were laundering money, they would not be disclosing its production cost.
7
u/Quick_Ordinary_7899 12d ago
Money laundering is not just spending money. It needs clean money coming in. It’s absolutely stupid that people keep applying the principles of money laundering to stuff like this. Money is laundered with the games you actually play, the movies you watch just to give you an idea of what it is about.
→ More replies (2)
22
u/AryaBanana 13d ago
Any proof that the intention behind this game was to launder money instead of it just being really, really bad?
5
6
5
4
u/Caelum_ 12d ago
Star Citizen is at $680 million after 12 years of development with a barely functional "game"
→ More replies (1)
6
4
u/Nentash 12d ago
I used to love Will Smith, I grew up watching him on TV and in movies, I even loved Wild Wild West (had it on dvd)... and then the slap happened.... and I lost all respect for the man, retroactively ruining everything I ever loved with him in it, and I hate him for that, for ruining so much good childhood memories.
→ More replies (2)
11.7k
u/Solid_Eagle0 13d ago
this is something you'd see browsing the internet in gta