Some staff apparently hoped Microsoft would cancel or reboot it
Redfallhas been a pretty notable stumble out of the gate for Xbox and Arkane. Today, a new report sheds some light on some of the behind-the-scenes tension that led toRedfall‘s troubled release.
Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier haspublished a new reportdiving into the development ofRedfall, which began in 2018. As the article outlines, it came from a goal of chasing “games as a service”, as ZeniMax reportedly urged developers to implement microtransactions.
At Arkane Austin, the team set out to create a multiplayer vampire shooter—Redfall—under co-directors Harvey Smith and Ricardo Bare. But as the story outlines, things got muddy.
Staff members told Bloomberg they found the pitch of “multiplayer Arkane game” confusing. This was compounded by shifting references to games likeBorderlandsandFar Cry, which apparently left departments with varying ideas of what they were creating. As Schreier writes, the tension between single-player and multiplayer design went unresolved.
The studio was also understaffed. Arkane Austin was already small for a live-service production, at less than 100 people. Sources tell Bloomberg that even with additional support from ZeniMax’s Roundhouse Studios and other outsourcing, the gaps couldn’t be filled.
Turnover kicked up. The report states about 70% of the staff that worked on Arkane’s prior projectPreyleft duringRedfall‘s development. And a mixture of lower-than-average salaries and the prospect of moving to Texas reportedly made staffing up difficult.
Things that go bump in the night
Via Bloomberg, some Arkane staff hoped thatfollowing the acquisitionof ZeniMax and Bethesda, Microsoft might cancelRedfallor allow the studio to reboot it as a single-player game. Instead, Microsoft took a hands-off approach. Xbox head Phil Spencer would later say in aninterview following Redfall’s launchthat the company “didn’t do a good job early” in engaging with Arkane Austin.
Redfallabsolutely fell short of expectations. While I still found a few slivers of things to enjoy in its world, I can’t say I’m really eager to go back anytime soon. For Arkane, I hope this specter doesn’t hang overhead too long.
