Slay the Princess dev tells players to pirate the game instead of just watching playthroughs

Slay the Princess was one of the biggest indie surprises of 2023, and its Steam player count has since exploded past the stratosphere after popular YouTuber Markiplier began a playthrough video series on June 22. To help the climb of Slay the Princess, developers at Black Tabby Games launched a Steam promo campaign that shaved off 20% of the game’s price, then did players one even better.

In a series of tweets originally caught by PCGamesN, Black Tabby Games’ official Twitter account addressed the people getting into the game through Markiplier’s video series. (Update: The tweets appeared as unavailable, but Black Tabby Games reached out to Destructoid clarifying that it has not deleted any tweets. The studio says Twitter/X has shadowbanned its account, so posts are not appearing properly for all users.)

Black Tabby talked about the game’s high reactiveness to the player’s choices, the game’s key aspect that will make every single playthrough a unique experience. Thus, the developers recommend you play the game on your own first — even if you have to resort to piracy, in case they can’t afford the game. They concluded by saying you can always buy a copy of the game later.

This remains an act of extreme good faith, one that will likely result in Slay The Princess receiving even more goodwill from the gaming community at large.

And now that the real-life conundrum some players were facing has been solved, now they only have to deal with the in-game conundrum of slaying the princess or dealing with the dire consequences.

You can get Slay The Princess for PC on Steam for $14.39 until the promotion ends on June 24, though it’s likely to go back down when the Steam Summer sale begins on June 27. You can also play it on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and you can get the free demo right here.

_{This post has been updated to clarify the status of Black Tabby Games’ original tweets.}