Jason Schreier: Inside the making of Redfall, Xbox's latest misfire

Started by the-pi-guy, Jun 01, 2023, 11:30 AM

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the-pi-guy

Bloomberg article

Jason shared article without paywall






Quote
The acquisition gave some staff at Arkane hope that Microsoft might cancel Redfall or, better yet, let them reboot it as a single-player game, according to sources familiar with the production. Instead, Microsoft maintained a hands-off approach. Aside from canceling a version of Redfall that had been planned for rival Sony Corp.'s PlayStation, Microsoft allowed ZeniMax to continue operating as it had before, with great autonomy. Microsoft's Spencer would later say in the Kinda Funny interview that Xbox "didn't do a good job early in engaging Arkane Austin."

kitler53

Jun 01, 2023, 12:42 PM Last Edit: Jun 01, 2023, 12:44 PM by kitler53
didn't read the article just what was in this thread but it sounds exactly like I would have guessed. mgt demanded not developers envisioned.

the MS part is strange though.  who thought,.. lets aquire a struggling developer and tell them to just keep doing what you're doing. 


Featured Artist: Vanessa Hudgens

BananaKing

didn't read the article just what was in this thread but it sounds exactly like I would have guessed. mgt demanded not developers envisioned.

the MS part is strange though.  who thought,.. lets aquire a struggling developer and tell them to just keep doing what you're doing.
How would they know its struggling? Xbox had so many studios acquired in such a short length of time. It seems the "hands off" approach wasn't to allow creativity, but was there because they can't manage everything

kitler53

Jun 01, 2023, 01:28 PM Last Edit: Jun 01, 2023, 02:34 PM by kitler53
How would they know its struggling? Xbox had so many studios acquired in such a short length of time. It seems the "hands off" approach wasn't to allow creativity, but was there because they can't manage everything
um.. because they specifically aquired studios that were in financial despair.   that was obvious to anyone.   they didn't aquire a single "successful" studio except maybe ABK and even then MS swooped in because of the accusations of a toxic workplace that allowed for sexual harassment and assault and top leadership ignoring it. 


Featured Artist: Vanessa Hudgens

kitler53

as a second thought i think the headliner is 70% attrition.  there is no reason to think this studio can recreate what people thought made them special in the past.   it's effectively a new studio with one dud to show for it.   the studio may never be able to recover from this.


Featured Artist: Vanessa Hudgens

Legend

as a second thought i think the headliner is 70% attrition.  there is no reason to think this studio can recreate what people thought made them special in the past.   it's effectively a new studio with one dud to show for it.   the studio may never be able to recover from this.
The article only talks about it briefly but Arkane were considered THE immersive sim studio. So many devs would go there because they were passionate about immersive sims so of course there'd be a mass exodus with this project.

I'm not satisfied with Schreier's reporting though. Deathloop was in a very similar situation yet turned out good so I really want to hear what the difference was between the two games. To me it feels more like an Arkane Austin management issue than anything else. They couldn't turn "multiplayer Arkane" into an exciting concept for the team while Arkane Lyon could.

kitler53

The article only talks about it briefly but Arkane were considered THE immersive sim studio. So many devs would go there because they were passionate about immersive sims so of course there'd be a mass exodus with this project.

I'm not satisfied with Schreier's reporting though. Deathloop was in a very similar situation yet turned out good so I really want to hear what the difference was between the two games. To me it feels more like an Arkane Austin management issue than anything else. They couldn't turn "multiplayer Arkane" into an exciting concept for the team while Arkane Lyon could.
it was of course a arkane austin management issue.   that's a key part of why the headliner is the 70% attrition rate.   this game would have been exactly this game with or without MS so there isn't anything salacious to talk about.   ...at least not as far as jason reported.


Featured Artist: Vanessa Hudgens