Insomniac's James Stevenson Condemns Millions of Negative Wolverine Posts After September Preview
Updated
Updated · Kotaku · Aug 16
Insomniac's James Stevenson Condemns Millions of Negative Wolverine Posts After September Preview
2 articles · Updated · Kotaku · Aug 16
Summary
James Stevenson said the "relentless onslaught" of online reaction to Marvel's Wolverine has made him rethink urging developers to read or post on X, calling the algorithm-driven negativity harmful to mental health.
Millions of views went to memes and critical clips after press previews showed Wolverine as a more straightforward, level-based action game rather than the open-world format some players expected from Insomniac.
Posts fixated on familiar AAA design tropes, difficulty and a Sentinel encounter some compared to an early-2000s boss fight, quickly overtaking written impressions from the event.
The backlash also fits a wider pattern in gaming discourse, where social platforms reward fast, bad-faith pile-ons and can turn pre-release trashing into the main event.