This comment is a little mean-spirited. This looks like an indie game that I would have expected to have launched during the time period that this was written, and it's a pretty good post-mortem on how the game was made, marketed, and where it failed.
> This looks like an indie game that I would have expected to have launched during the time period that this was written
Disagree. I think it genuinely looks significantly worse: it's so thoroughly brown, and the blocky level design looks like a zillion super mario clones. That seems like a bigger factor to me; yes, it matters that you can't tell what's going on looking at the gameplay, but that would be much less of an issue if it looked good/interesting.
Its realistic and factual. Game was made for Ouya by a studio specializing in Flash games. Its still $10 after 7 years, would you pay $10 for this game?
The brand backing helps, but Nintendo still sells plenty of copies of Mario, the gameplay if which wasn't all that inspired back in the day either. Even Spelunky is just a good implementation of a type of game dating back to the late eighties.
Consider indie titles like Minecraft and PUBG taking off with completely ripped off assets and game ideas because they made a great version of an existing concept. Minecraft had the visual style of a 2005 bargain bin game and PUBG is the blandest of bland models and art design coupled with a good implementation of their earlier mod. You don't need to be all that original, gameplay or art style wise, to make a game successful.
I don't think this particular art style was all that common on the PS4 or Xbox One. There was a lot wrong with the way they presented and marketed the game, but I don't think the art style is that much of a problem.
