Larian lead Swen Vincke backed by Atomfall CEO as AAA publishers continue to fail both gamers and developers

It’s no secret that the games industry is unstable right now. With veteran devs claiming the industry is “unsustainable” and massive projects fail weeks after release, it’s smaller developers like Larian Studios that are keeping gaming alive.

After speaking at The Game Awards last December about the fight between developer and publisher, Larian Studios CEO and Baldur’s Gate 3 director Swen Vincke has become an icon in the industry. As it turns out, the BG3 creator is not alone as Rebellion CEO Jason Kingsley has backed the Larian lead as AAA publishers continue to fail not just gamers, but developers as well.

Rebellion joins Larian against AAA publishers

Speaking to PC Gamer, Kingsley resonated with Vincke’s statements at The Game Awards 2024. “I’ve been fighting with publishers my entire life,” Vincke said on stage in front of the industry’s biggest names. “And I keep on seeing the same mistakes, over and over and over. It’s always the quarterly profits. The only thing that matters is the numbers.”

Kingsley explained that not only was Vincke absolutely correct, but the story of the Larian lead’s struggles against publishers was “very much” the same as his. With a history of working with SEGA on Aliens vs Predator and Zenimax on a number of titles, Rebellion has a history of being put through the ringer by publishers.

“It cuts across every industry,” the Rebellion CEO said. “But I am aware a lot of my colleagues get frustrated from time to time by people who are potentially very good managers but aren’t specialists in the computer games area.”

While Rebellion is now isolated on its own, creating Sniper Elite and the just-released Atomfall with little external involvement, the studio is extremely familiar with interference from publishers.

“There are horror stories of people having external producers saying, ‘Look, you just need to make fewer bugs, because then it’ll be faster to make.'”

REBELLION CEO JASON KINGSLEY ON AAA PUBLISHERS

“There are horror stories of people having external producers saying, ‘Look, you just need to make fewer bugs, because then it’ll be faster to make.’ And everybody’s going ‘Yeah, you’re right, yeah. We really shouldn’t have decided to put 1,500 bugs in,'” the CEO said.

Nevertheless, Kingsley explained that the massive wave of industry layoffs was inevitable due to the industry’s reaction to the COVID pandemic. As user spending skyrocketed, companies over-invested in talent which only exacerbated cuts made by companies such as Xbox, PlayStation and other AAA companies this past year.

“I think possibly the games industry expanded a bit too fast during Covid,” he said. “You know, we had really good times, and everybody was locked in and was playing computer games. And then the correction came, yeah, and that correction has been very rapid and sudden, and, you know, bloody awful, quite frankly.”

While Rebellion hasn’t made an internationally beloved title on the level of Baldur’s Gate 3, it’s a studio with heart. There aren’t 700 developers working on a game at the studio which results in games that have not just an identity, but a soul.

I’ve loved running through the world of Atomfall far more than I’ve enjoyed running through any COD mission in the last decade, and it’s because it actually feels like it’s made by people. It’s the same as exploring Skyrim versus exploring Starfield—there’s just too many hands in the same pie and it’s resulting in mush.