Why Fall Guys Will Not Be Long Lived

I am pretty sure many of you have heard the game called Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout. The game is published in February but it seems to be catching people's attention these days. It is at its peak right now and increasing in players daily. However I don't think this game will be long lived even though it is getting a great interaction on Twitch and Youtube as we speak. Let me tell you why I don't think this game will be long lived.

The Twitch Effect:

Let's briefly talk about why the game got a good growth wave first. I see Twitch as the major reason of this game's growth. The procedure works like following. A fun looking game comes out, few streamers find out about the game and play it. New and cool looking games always catch attention and as the game climbs the discover page, more and more streamers play the game like we also see with the game Among Us these days. With this cycle Fall Guys catched a good upswing but it is just a matter of time to face the real fall.


Some Similar Party Games:

Even Fall Guys sometimes mentioned as a Battle Royale game, I categorize it as a full Party Game. And I think it as a game like Gang Beasts or Party Panic. Let's try to remember the attention curve of these two games. When Gang Beasts was at its peak streamers were gathering up and playing the game together for the entire stream but after content dried out, Gang Beasts tried to back the game up with the updates but it was not enough to avoid the inevitable fall. It lost the viewers dramatically and lost its hype.

If we consider the Party Panic case, I see that game as a longer running game. It was probably not successful as Gang Beasts but why did it run longer then ? The answer is diversity. Party Panic included many different minigames with different and unique mechanics. Not being stuck on a single play style made the game fun for more players. But in the end the content it offers also dried out as a fate of the party games.

What Will Be Added to Fall Guys ?

Unfortunately, Fall Guys is a game more like Gang Beasts. You try to get over the obstacles and throw others out. So their formula only supports few things like adding new maps or maybe adding new obstacles. Now try to picture a community who is bored from all the maps being played. When you introduce few new mechanics, they might get a little excited but the fact that they have to play every other map and obstacle they are hating by now will not help the game. I definitely expect the new map approach from the game developers but will it help ? The fact that controls of the game is so limited they won't be able to bring much new things to the table. So I don't see players playing the new map happily when new map is just the similar obstacles in a different order and colors.

Predictions:

As party game fate requires, I see Fall Guys will be joining its ancestors pretty soon. I expect this game to be at its peak in 1.5 - 2 months and at the end of 2020 or maybe early 2021 this game will be at the same level with the other party games on Steam.