In the latest episode of the Kinda Funny Games podcast, Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer commented on the negative reception to Arkane Austin’s Redfall. The executive took full responsibility while saying he won’t apologize for the creative aspirations of the teams.
In my pre-release interview with Creative Director Harvey Smith, I was told that Redfall was one of the studio’s many attempts to stretch the immersive simulation genre in various directions. Redfall tried to add open world and co-op elements to the winning formula they had with Dishonored, but it didn’t work nearly as well, as I pointed out in my review-in-progress.
Anyway, Spencer highlighted Microsoft’s commitment to improving games over time (such as Rare’s Sea of Thieves and Obsidian’s Grounded) and mentioned how Arkane Austin is already taking the feedback. Lastly, Spencer also said there is a ‘good timeline’ for adding 60 frames per second support on Xbox Series consoles. Below you can find the full quote.
There’s nothing that’s more difficult for me than disappointing the Xbox company. Just watching the community lose confidence and be disappointed makes me disappointed. I’m upset with myself, making me revisit our process. I think back to the announcement of 60 frames per second, but then we weren’t shipping with 60 frames per second and that was kind of our punch in the chin, rightfully, from a couple of weeks ago.
The critical response wasn’t what we wanted. I’ll pick myself and think, what can we learn, what can we do better? One thing I’ll fight is what went wrong. There’s clearly quality and execution things that we can do, but one thing I won’t do is push against the creative aspirations of our teams. I’m a huge supporter of Arkane Austin. Their track record is awesome. I love a lot of the games that they’ve built. This is one where the team didn’t hit their own internal goals when it launched. I think it is maybe a little simplistic to say, hey, if you would have just delayed for three months, the core creative of the game would have delivered on something that was different than it was.
The team at Arkane is on taking the near-term feedback. We’re still working on the 60 frames per second, we have a good timeline for that. We’re committed to getting that done. We’re going to continue to work the game. I think we’ve shown a committment to games like Sea of Thieves and Grounded to continue to build games. I also know that these games are $70 and I’ll take full responsibility for launching a game that needs to be great.
Needless to say, pressure will increase for Bethesda Game Studios to deliver a great game with Starfield, currently scheduled to be released on September 6th. More information will be shared with the Starfield Direct scheduled for June 11th.
