The developer behind first-person shooter survival horror game series S.T.A.L.K.E.R. , the Ukraine-based GSC Game World, originally discovered back in December, 2011 due to “personal reasons” on behalf of the developer’s CEO, Sergei Grigorovich, according to a report Polygon back in 2013.
Three year’s later to the month, GSC Game World has announced its re-establishment, and according to an interview with GamesIndustry, the reassembled developer is looking to start afresh.
In speaking with Valentine Yeltyshev, one of the original members of the GSC Game World team, light was shed on why exactly the studio shut down a few years ago and where exactly the resurrected developer plans to go next.
According to Yeltyshev it was a “ combination of issues ” that led to the developer’s initial closure, including the personal decision made by Grigorovich. S.T.A.L.K.E.R.’s direct sequel was being worked on during this time, the development of which was concealed a few months after the studio shut down. It was during this development cycle that initiated GSC Game World to close, as the team was the wasn’t fully prepared to work on a full sequel rather than expansion packs to the original S.T.A.L.K.E.R. game
” Well it’s a combination of issues, not just a financial one, and it was also a personal decision by our CEO. Actually, STALKER 2 was in the middle of development, but we started to realise that we weren’t ready to complete the game at the level of quality that we thought it should be. That was connected to a lack of specific people in the team, ” Yeltyshev explained to GamesIndustry.
“ We realised that STALKER 2 was different. It was going to take too much time – by the time it was ready, it was definitely going to be out of date. We had the scenarios all written by the guy who did the original STALKER , but that’s just a scenario, not a full game. We were closer to the beginning of development than the end.
It was a difficult decision, because the team was working towards a full-scale game, but they and our CEO understood that the game just wouldn’t be at the level we wanted from STALKER 2 . There was also a problem getting interest, and the right money, from publishers. We were offered funding once we reached alpha. Actually we would have been able to fund the entire development ourselves, but we still weren’t sure we’d be able to sell it once we’d got to alpha. ”
In regards to its new game, of which has still yet to be officially announced, GSC Game World, despite being a few years behind, isn’t looking to catch on to the current gaming trend of free-to-play and mobile. Yeltyshev assures that the developer remains confident about its fans and where the its audience lies, and feels that models like free-to-play isn’t right for the game the studio wants to develop. So, GSC Game World will be working to build an old-fashioned, full-priced game.
” We’re pretty sure about our fans. The market we’re in is quite old fashioned, they’re not 16 year olds, they’re 25-40 years old. We don’t think free-to-play is the right model for the game we want to make. So we’re making an old-fashioned, full price game, we think our audience will be happy about that. We’re expecting a lot of our old audience! ”
You can read GamesIndustry’s full interview with Valentine Yeltyshev via the source link below. We’ll bring you more news on GSC Game World’s new game should further news reach our ears.
[ Source(s): GamesIndustry ]
[ Via: Polygon ]