Bethesda: “We’ll survive even if a big title flops”

Bethesda’s Pete Hines has discussed the publisher’s business strategies aswell as pointed out that over-reliance on the success of a particular franchise or title is “bad management” in  an interview with GI Biz.

He stated that the company’s steady progression is a lot more manageable now, after it has shed its boom and bust tactics:

“It would be wholly irresponsible for us to build towards a company that released three or four big games a year and then have our well being fall apart if any one of those doesn’t do well,” explained Hines.

“That would be poor management on our part. So obviously we expect big things and we’re planning big things, but we haven’t mortgaged our future such that the next game that comes out has to hit certain numbers or else we’re in big trouble. We’ve been built smarter and better than that.”

Hines however stated that striking the right balance is key to success, and one should not spread out the company’s assets and talent too thin.

“The answer is not churning out 30,40, 50 games a year; the answer is not trying to be in every genre. Not ‘oh no, now it’s the casual, now it’s social gaming!’ We don’t go running after the latest, hottest trend. We tend to pay attention to what we’re doing, we the make that kind of games that we want to play, because we think there’s an audience for those and we try as best we can to execute them to the highest level possible – whether that’s development, PR, marketing or sales.

“That’s how we’re structured. We’re not structured to put out 50 games a year and now suddenly we’re only going ten, now we’re laying people off left and right. We’ve been hiring and hiring non-stop for years, while other folks are laying off and downsizing.

“I certainly hate to see those kinds of things, but I think when you see it, it relates to them and their business, and doesn’t really have anything to do with us because we’re built to do what it is we’re doing now – which is a couple of big games a year. We have that this year, we have that next year – obviously we’ve only announced one of those [Prey 2] but we’re now hitting the spot that we have been growing towards for years and years.”