A screenshot from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (2024), Focus Entertainment

Saber Interactive’s Chief Creative Officer Tim Willits shared his thoughts on why so many AAA video game developers are failing.

A screenshot from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (2024), Focus Entertainment

Speaking to IGN, Willits first rejected the idea that gamers were moving on from certain genres. He informed the outlet, “It is not necessarily the genre that has moved on, because great games will always do well.”

Next, he shared one of the core beliefs at Saber that he believes allows the company to succeed again and again, “One of the things that we try to do at Saber, and this is part of my job as creative officer of all the teams, we have a core belief that what you do every second and what happens when you push these buttons and that core gameplay loop is so critical. So we focus on the moment-to-moment interaction in the gameplay and the feeling you have.”

“And then we adhere to our core pillars, like be the ultimate Space Marine, melee, ranged, swarms, that’s it,” Willits added.

A screenshot from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (2024), Focus Entertainment

He then returned to what he sees as mistakes that other developers make that lead to their demise, “And a lot of teams throughout development will over-scope games.”

“They look at some other game that just came out and say, ‘oh, we got to do that, let’s add this, we got to do this.’ And they lose focus on the core, what actually makes the game fun,” he explained.

A screenshot from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (2024), Focus Entertainment

Instead, he shares that Space Marine 2 developers and Saber focus on the basics, “We are not in Space Marine 2 doing things that… well, the swarms are new technology, but there isn’t some revolutionary new gameplay mechanic that no one’s ever seen before.”

“There are gameplay mechanics that people are familiar with, but we do it really, really well. And we execute really, really well,” he stated.

A screenshot from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (2024), Focus Entertainment

READ: ‘Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2’ Developer Matthew Karch Appears To Confirm Authenticity Of His Comment Decrying Games At Embracer Group That Had “Overblown Attempts At Messaging Or Imposing Morals On Gamers”

He also noted that Saber was able to keep its costs down on Space Marine 2. He told IGN, “We don’t need to sell four million units to make [Space Marine 2] a success.”

However, this is not the case for many developers, “There are many games, sadly, especially out of North American developers, where if you do not sell five million copies you are a failure. I mean, what business are we in where you fail if you sell less than five million?”

“There are examples like that, and we do not want to be that business,” he stated. “We want to be a developer that focuses on the core experience, what makes the games actually fun, and then do it really well and then make it affordably.”

A screenshot from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (2024), Focus Entertainment

He then pointed to Saber’s success as sticking to the basics and not trying to revolutionize gameplay mechanics, “Look at SnowRunner! Dude, SnowRunner is literally driving trucks through mud. That’s it, I’m done. I just described the game. 15 million people played it because the experience is perfect.”

“Look at World War Z. Like, come on, we’re not going to get an Academy Award for that game, but 25 million people have played it because it’s just this perfectness, and that’s what we do well,” he reiterated.

A screenshot from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (2024), Focus Entertainment

Willits’ comments about budgets echoes what Saber Interactive Co-Founder and CEO Matthew Karch said about AAA development back in April.

He told IGN, “In general, I would say that AAA development has become very risky. And that’s where Saber is different. Saber, I believe, can create AAA, but not at a AAA budget.”

Furthermore, he noted that the $70 price tag for games would increase due to the increasing costs to produce the games for many studios, “I think that as games become more expensive to make, the $70 title is going to go the way of the dodo [bird]. I do. I just don’t think it’s sustainable…Look, you remember the hype for Cyberpunk, which I think actually ultimately performed okay, but when the expectations are so high and so much money is put into one title, it’s hugely risky for the company that’s doing it. What if it fails?”

A screenshot from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (2024), Saber Interactive

As far as Willits’ comments regarding not revolutionizing gameplay mechanics, but mastering gameplay mechanics that players are already familiar with, it’s hard to argue with what he is stating. This is analysis and commentary you might hear regarding professional athletes especially in hockey. If a team is struggling, one of the best pieces of advice they can get is to stop trying to overcomplicate things and get back to basics and do those basics extraordinarily well. It usually turns out well.

In fact, a recent example of how well it can do other than Space Marine 2, is Persona 5. The game uses classic turn-based gameplay mechanics in a tried and true genre and found massive success. The success for developer Atlus allowed them to spin the series off into multiple different genres and dare I say supplant Final Fantasy as the dominant turn-based RPG series of the generation.

A screenshot of Persona 5 Royal (2022), Atlus

While Willits brings up a number of valid points, he did not touch on the woke factor whatsoever. And that factor cannot be ignored especially given the creation of KabrutusRambo’s Sweet Baby Inc detected Steam curator list that effectively serves as a boycott list for any games that have a whiff of woke ideology injected into them.

As of writing the curator has 446,331 followers. It is one of the top five largest curators on Steam.

A screenshot of the Sweet Baby Inc. Detected curator list on Steam

And while Willits did not bring it up, Karch did in a YouTube comment on Asmongold’s channel. He wrote, “Hey man. CEO of Saber here. I love your videos. When we signed the deal to make Space Marine 2, all I wanted was a throwback game. We had the chance to work on something which by its nature was ‘old school’.”

“I can’t even comprehend many of the current games that we play these days. They are too complex and too much of an investment,” he added.

Next, he shared that he was inspired by Halo, “We worked on Halo back in the day, and that game could be distilled down to the simplest of shooting loops, but it was entirely addicting. That is what we wanted to recapture.”

A screenshot from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (2024), Focus Entertainment

Karch then shared his hope that Space Marine 2 and Black Myth: Wukong are the start of a revival in the video game industry to get back to fun and immersion.

He wrote, “I hope that games like Space Marine 2 and Wukong are the start of a reversion to a time when games were simply about fun and immersion.”

A screenshot from Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 (2024), Saber Interactive

Finally, he lamented the state of the industry during his brief time as Chief Operating Officer at Embracer Group, “I spent some time as Chief Operating Officer at Embracer and I saw games there that made me want to cry with their overblown attempts at messaging or imposing morals on gamers.”

“We just want to do some glory kills and get the heart rate up a little. For me that is what games should be about,” he concluded.

Matthew Karch on YouTube

What do you make of Willits’ comments about why so many AAA games are failing?