Paradox Interactive Cancels Several Unannounced Games As It Shifts Focus to "its proven game niches"

From GameWatcher: "Publisher Paradox Interactive has announced its decision to cancel several unannounced games, as it shifts focus towards "its proven game niches and projects that better meet the company’s requirements on returns and risk."

The company has written down the value of these canceled projects, which will impact its Q3 2021 profit before tax with a decrease of 135 MSEK, roughly the equivalent of $5 million dollars. As previous financial reports show, Paradox Interactive has canceled other unannounced games over the course of the last year, amounting to a total of 265 MSEK in write-offs."

[Darkborn]

And this is a big problem in the gaming market. It's hard to innovate and try new things because the numbers show battle Royale and micro transactions sell. That's why GTA 6 isn't even announced yet. The same thing was done with epic when fortnite was found out to be successful. I actually played the save the world version before the battle Royale launched and like it as well as paragon. Both those were scrapped and another game or two once they saw the successful launch of the battle Royale.

[PrinceAli]

This is a GROSS over simplification and completely ignores the reality of the video games market from the perspective of the Devs and publishers! Video game development is all about scope and scale, the fact is Devs and Publishers aren't interested in making money they're only interested in making ALL the money so making millions ISN'T enough they want to make 10s if not 100s of millions from the product.
Th e games industry has shifted away from the 90s and 2000s era of development where studios were absolutely ecstatic to sell in the 100s of thousands and break into the past 1 million sold milestone which automaticlaly made the game an incredible success! Now games need to sell multiple millions and even when they do it still falls short of the expected sales target! Its sort of how the movie industry has become due to the success of the MCU, movies are ALL looking to break that 1 billion mark and use that as the target for success which is just the stupidest thing ever!

[monkey602]

Absolutely correct.

1 title launching and becoming a success is no good to the producers if it doesn't effect the studios fiscal year earnings enough.
Theres no reason to celebrate the financial profit of a game if it hasn't grossly increased the years earnings over prior years. This is better suited to low production costs with live service income.

This kills smaller projects because their profit to production ratios just aren't appealing enough to investors. Big money isn't enough, it needs to be all the money.

Activision are a disgusting example of this. Despite all the success of the titles they've released over the last fews years. Each one pulling in a profit, they still hit their studios with massive layoffs and closures because they wanted to protect that annual financial gain. Or the perception of it at least.

[NeoGamer232]

Your post also has problems.

Investors in publishers and developers are the ones driving the trends. Investors want the largest return possible. Therefore the developers and publishers they invest in only consider the ideas that are going to make them the money they are looking for.

Like it or not, AAA games are expensive to make. If an investor says, "I want a billion dollar idea" then that's what the developers and publishers will try to build in the least risky way possible.

I am sure that if you were to talk to most development studios and publishers they want creative and unique game experiences. The problem is convincing investors that these creative and unique ideas will yield the revenue and profit they are looking for.

Most publishers are publicly traded or are owned by an investment firm. They are accountable to make money for the investors. This is the root problem. When games weren't such big money and didn't require 100's of millions to build, the world was a lot simpler. But, now big games require big money to build and the investors don't give that for free.

[Darkborn]

And why are you being mad at me? I basically explained that in less words. People saw the way of money and followed that trend. Look at GTA 5, that game has made so much money it deterred them from making single player dlc and a new game. Look at rdr2 that followed the same formula and only got multiplayer stuff like GTA 5. Fortnite is all multiplayer now. Look at batttlefield 2042, only multiplayer with skins and dlc packs. This is the problem I was speaking of. It's simply hard for devs to explain to execs that there game will sell well and make tons of profit because it won't. Or at least not as much as a huge multiplayer component will that has the same formula.

[GhostofHorizon]

Somebody picked up Paragon and they are bringing it back under a new name - Predecessor.

[TheColbertinator]

Paradox does have the right to abandon uncertain gaming projects and sticking to the more profitable IPs as it seems fit.

However I found Paradox to be a unique publisher because it created experiences I could find nowhere else with such polish. Maybe those cancelled Paradox projects were more ambitious and interesting than most games out now.

[Silly gameAr]

Dude, I really like your troll post because they're funny as hell, but when you're being serious, you're right 99% of the time.