LogInThat's their advantage compared to triple-A titles.
Image credit: Sumo Digital, DeathSprint 66
Andrew Willans, the Director behind DeathSprint 66, an upcoming hardcore arcade racing from Sumo Digital, which is set to arrive later this year, recently shared in an interview that small games that are being developed by tiny teams have the chance "to be a bit more creative" since they don't have a big budget and a plethora of time.
"I think that [under $70] price bracket … it allows you to be a bit more creative," said Willans to PC Gamer. "If you've got a more limited budget than triple-A, and you've got a more limited timeframe to do it, I think you get more innovation on that scale.
It's not indie, and it's not triple-A, it's somewhere in between. And when I look at the indie market and the amount of innovation constantly being pushed, there are really exciting things there which you don't tend to see in the bigger triple-A games. And I think there's this lovely middle ground, where we're aiming to be as a studio."
In the past, Willans was employed at Ubisoft, making games like The Division and Watch Dogs, but the project he considers his greatest achievement is Grow Home, a highly praised physics climbing game created by a small group at Ubisoft Reflections.
Speaking of their upcoming game, DeathSprint 66, Willans shared that half of their Sumo Digital team, which has around 80 employees, are engaged in development. Willans also added that being a smaller team enables them to involve junior developers in game development and showcase the result of their creations without having to wait several years.
"There's lots of people on our team that might be quite junior to the industry. And these kinds of games allow them to feel buy-in and ownership, be a part of something that they're going to see in one to two years time, compared to some of the games I've worked on in my career that took four-and-a-half years to reach the market," Willans said. "At the end of that I'm just exhausted, the teams are exhausted. And it feels like it's all on that moment, and if that's not a success, that's hard, you know? If it doesn't take off."
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