Players in Russia expressed their desire to donate money to the studio.
Recently, Russian players have obviously been in a state of considerable depression – because of the Russo-Ukrainian war, players in the region have been unable to buy games on most retail platforms, including Steam and eShop, and it has become a luxury to get games through normal channels.
Not long ago, there was also a news about the unblocking of RuTracker, a well-known pirate resource website in Russia, which was considered by many domestic netizens to be the "anti-sanction" of the Russian game industry against European and American game manufacturers. RuTracker was not unblocked by the Russian government (in fact, only Russian IP still has no direct access to the site).
Even some games made by local Russian developers have a hard time playing them, such as Loop Hero, a dark horse of last year's rave reviews. The strategy game with Roguelike elements was completed by just four developers, logged into multiple platforms including Steam, Epic, and eShop, and is currently unavailable to Russian players.
This situation will obviously cause some damage to the four-person studio Four Quarters – at least in recent times, Russian players have only been able to experience the games they develop in pirated ways. Recently, some players were worried about their losses in Russia and came specifically to inquire about the situation, so this Sunday, Four Quarters responded to this on VKontakte (a Russian social networking platform), publicly supporting players who could not buy Loop Hero to play pirated copies.
Four Quarters claims that none of the Steam and eShop where their games are currently available can buy the game (for Russian players), so until everything returns to normal, they support players to "play pirated games at full power" and even attach a pirate download link on RuTracker. The official also intimately reminds Russian players that if you want to download pirated copies on RuTracker, you need to prepare a VPN yourself.
This attitude has obviously won the favor of players in the Russian region. Constrained by objective reasons, most Russian players said on the spot that as long as everything returns to normal, they will definitely make up the ticket to express support. At the same time, in the comments section of this tweet, a comment that wanted to donate money to the studio was topped the hot review position.
"At least give me a way to make money publicly, and let me support you."
There are not a few players who want to actually support Four Quarters, so the official voice on VK two days later, modestly saying that they did nothing, just pointed out a "way" for players. Four Quarters also said that it has received the kindness of the players, and said that the current developers are all right, and the players can rest assured.
At the beginning of the Russo-Ukrainian War, Four Quarters also publicly expressed its anti-war attitude on Twitter. When the news of this "active piracy" spread to other regions, the studio also received the support of many players.
Although everyone's political stance may not be the same, supporting developers who are dedicated to players is probably a true portrayal of "games without borders".