Ten years ago today, the hit game Human: Fall Flat first appeared. It was not an immediate hit, but then it infected the Chinese market.
Among the best-selling games of all time, every now and then there is a title that you would never guess would have achieved worldwide fame. And the best example of that is the Lithuanian hit Human: Fall Flatwhich appeared 10 years ago today.
This puzzle platformer combined simplicity, physicality and humor into one package that proved extremely addictive. It offered players independent or cooperative play of various thematic levels, and its graphics were simple enough to become playable on all imaginable platforms, including mobile devices.
The story about the origin of this game is interesting. Developer Tomas Sakalauskas quit his job to develop games, but ran out of budget before he could complete anything. Human: Fall Flat was his last attempt before giving upand initially he envisioned the game as a linear puzzle adventure. However, his son tested the game and during the testing he neglected to solve the challenges and had fun with the physics, and this kind of approach was later reflected in the design of the game itself.
Although Human: Fall Flat garnered only mediocre reviews (70 on Metacritic), the game initially sold two million copies. It continued to sell well after that, but the key moment came when it launched in China during the COVID-19 pandemic, after which the game reached 25 million players. Since then, Human: Fall Flat thanks to its low price and high availability has come to a whopping 58 million copies soldmaking it one of the top 15 best-selling games of all time.
A sequel to this game, announced back in 2003, is currently in development, but it is not yet known when we will be able to play it.