Crystal Dynamics Says Perfect Dark Development Is Going “Extremely Well” | VGC

Crystal dynamics [142 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/companies/crystal-dynamics/”>Crystal Dynamics claimed that its co-development work on Xbox [6,042 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/platforms/xbox/”>Xbox Perfect Black [57 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/games/perfect-dark/”>The Perfect Dark reboot is progressing “extremely well”.

That’s according to Crystal Dynamics and Eidos CEO Phil Rogers, who provided an update on the project during parent company Embracer Group. [80 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/companies/embracer-group/”>Embracer Group Earnings Call Thursday.

It was announced in September 2021 that Xbox had signed Crystal Dynamics to co-develop Perfect Dark, which is the first game from Xbox Game Studios (Microsoft) [2,304 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/companies/microsoft/”>Microsoft’s new internal studio The Initiative [55 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/companies/microsoft/the-initiative/”>The Initiative.

“We’re working on the iconic game Perfect Dark and the project is going extremely well,” Rogers said today (transcribed by VGC).

“What has been so promising internally is seeing how our team has embraced this opportunity, a new way of working. If we think about the future of the way we work, collaboration across studios, time zones, geographies, different companies will become more commonplace, so it’s great to see the team at The Initiative and our team at Crystal Studios work so well together.

His comments echo those of Xbox Game Studios boss Matt Booty [62 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/people/matt-booty/”>Matt Booty, who said in September that the days of single studios working on large-scale games were “long gone” .

During a Q&A at PAX West, Booty said, “So we just did this big partnership with Crystal Dynamics, and I read online, ‘oh, that must mean there’s a problem or something’ – it’s quite the opposite, isn’t it?

“You have this team of veterans at Crystal Dynamics, a large AAA team with over 100 people becoming available. Of course we want to work with them, especially if they have already made a game like this.

“And that’s how we did a lot of work. If you think of Age of Empires 4 [8 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/games/age-of-empires-4/”>Age of Empires 4 which just launched last fall, which was made in partnership with Relic Studios in Vancouver, great partnership And even something like Flight Simulator (2020) [90 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/games/flight-simulator-2020/”>Flight Simulator, we worked with a studio in France called Asobo [52 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/companies/asobo/”>Asobo.

“And that kind of co-development, when you work with people like Certain Affinity [30 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/companies/certain-affinity/”>Certain Affinity [ Halo [359 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/games/halo/”>Halo], Iron Galaxy [Killer Instinct]blackbird [ Minecraft [185 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/games/minecraft/”>Minecraft Legends]all of these studios are so essential to the products we make.

“That, however, also adds some complexity where if one of those studios has issues, then that impacts the schedule.

“So the days are over when you could kind of say ‘everybody, get the team together in the cafeteria, I want to tell everybody to work harder this Wednesday. It’s long gone, it’s gotten a lot more complicated than that.

VGC reported in March that all was not well with Perfect Dark and that The Initiative had seen a “fast and furious” wave of senior departures over the past year.

Up to half of the core development team known to be working on the reboot left the company over a 12-month period, leading to an increased in-game role for Crystal Dynamics.

At the time, The Initiative’s management told VGC they were confident in the team they had in place and in bringing in new talent, and highlighted the staffing challenges at the industry-wide during the Covid-19 pandemic.

However, the Initiative’s current and former lead developers, VGC, attributed the wave of departures to frustration with the project’s direction set by studio head Darrell Gallagher, who also previously ran Crystal Dynamics, and the director of the game Daniel Neuburger, who previously held the same position. role at the Tomb Raider studio and himself left Xbox earlier this year.

During Thursday’s earnings call, Rogers also provided updates on several other projects in development at Crystal Dynamics and Eidos.

Crystal Dynamics said in April that the next Tomb Raider game entered development using Unreal Engine 5.

“Our partnership with Epic Games [684 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/companies/epic-games/”>Epic Games and integrating Unreal Engine 5 into our dev toolchain really allows us to push storytelling to new levels. new levels,” Rogers said. “We have yet to release any details on the franchise plans, but the team is excited to show where we are headed as soon as possible next year.

He also said that last year’s Guardians of the Galaxy game from Eidos Montreal [117 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/companies/eidos-montreal/”>Eidos Montreal recently reached a new milestone as a player.

“Our award-winning Guardians of the Galaxy game has just celebrated its one-year anniversary and with that, we have surpassed eight million players. We have seen great engagement from players with this title coming to Game Pass and PlayStation. [6,544 articles]” href=”https://www.videogameschronicle.com/platforms/playstation/”>PlayStation Plus just recently.

“I actually just got back from a few days in Montreal,” Rogers continued. “The team is very proud of the game they’ve created and there’s also great excitement now about how we’re driving it commercially within our own business unit.”

It was recently claimed that a new Deus Ex game is in very early development at Eidos Montreal, and that the studio is working on a new IP and collaborating with Microsoft on Xbox games, including Fable.

“We really aren’t sharing anything here, but stay tuned for next year when we hope to come back and tell you more about the games we’re working on at Eidos,” Rogers said.

Finally, the executive revealed that Crystal Dynamics received an overwhelming response to a recent survey designed to gauge interest in a potential revival of its long-dormant Legacy of Kain series.