I'm concerned a little bit about how this is being reported and the comments:
1) Phil Fish probably isn't a reliable source on any numbers, especially the "less than 1% affected" number. This is a guy trying to downplay severity of the problem. It's possible those affected are anywhere from 25% to 100% of those who finish the game and get the title update.
2) If it's 1% of 100,000+ sales, that's only 1,000+ people affected - this doesn't seem to jibe with comments online - it looks like more than a couple thousand are affected. I'd be interested to see what happens once the patch goes live again.
3) Phil Fish and Polytron have made hundreds of thousands of dollars on Fez already. Quick napkin estimate: $1,000,000 in sales minus $300,000 Microsoft's cut = $700,000 left for the two-man Polytron. $700,000 for two guys for 5 years is $70,000 each per year. Not too shabby. These guys can afford a patch, even if it is "Tens of thousands" of dollars - they are choosing not to, and abandoning consumers. It's not the first time this has happened on XBLA, but it's pretty rare to abandon your project so dramatically and unapologetically.
4) It's not being reported that this is the 3rd shot - Polytron had the 1st opportunity to release a working game and came up short. For their second opportunity, they released a patch that corrupts save files - this patch opportunity was provided free by Microsoft. For their 3rd opportunity, they claim to have the problem fixed but aren't interested in paying to release their second patch (notice they haven't said they can't afford it - this is their choice).
Honestly - kudos to Microsoft for taking the high road with this and "remaining fans of Fez" - there isn't anything they can do at this point. Phil Fish has basically just shot his career in the foot - from now on anytime he talks about a game or announces a game or works on a game, there will be someone there to point out, "Hey, is Phil Fish going to break this game and leave us all high and dry?"
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