In light of last month’s announcement that Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 had reached 7 million players, CEO Geoffroy Sardin of Pullup Entertainment—parent company of publisher Focus Entertainment—has said in an interview with The Game Business that the company “didn’t believe” that the action game could end up being so popular.
The interview, coming shortly after the studio’s financial results revealed revenue growth of 132 percent year-on-year, included Sardin talking about the studio’s philosophy when it comes to making and publishing games.
“We remain true to what we believe in: uncompromising gameplay,” said Sardin, before going on to talk about the fact that Pullup Entertainment is more interested in making and publishing games for “someone” rather than for “everyone”. He also spoke about how it ultimately comes down to execution of ideas.
“The road to success for us is based on a simple idea: players are looking for niche and very targeted, impactful experiences,” Sardin explained. “The core of our manifesto is we do not design and produce games for everyone. We design and produce games for someone. And when the execution is good, [it might] end up resonating with many more people.”
“It’s exactly what happened with Space Marine 2. To be very frank, we didn’t believe before we launched that we could hit seven million unique players. It was incredible for us. The word of mouth, combined with the perfect execution done by our partner Saber Interactive, meant we managed to expand the audience from the passionate Warhammer people, to people who can enjoy all the features of Space Marine 2.”
Sardin also discussed the current state of the video game industry. He noted that, while many other companies might be struggling at the moment, the business as a whole is healthier than it looks. He noted that this largely came down to overall stability in the industry after quite a few years of growth. While there might be some drawbacks thanks to “a wave of over investment”, Sardin believes that the industry going through a phase where not all projects – especially those with “limited ROI” – can’t get financing is a necessary process.
“We all know the last few years have been very challenging,” said Sardin. “It’s all over the news. But, strip out the noise and you will be surprised by many positive realities.”
“First of all, the industry has not grown over the past few years, but it has stabilized at a very high level after years of impressive growth. The industry remains powerful. And it is used to having phases of stabilization before returning to growth. It is currently impacted by a past wave of over investment; I saw you’ve talked about that recently with other interviews. But this has been the case in the past and it’s recovered each time. It is going through a phase where projects with limited ROI can’t find financing anymore. This is a necessary process to me. It gets the industry back on a growth trajectory.”
Sardin brought up the fact that games like Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 and Monster Hunter Wilds are all setting and breaking sales records in a wide range of different genres and markets.
“Pullup and Space Marine 2 are not alone in having a great year,” he said. “Look at the really strong numbers achieved recently by our Frenchy friends with Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, and also Monster Hunter Wilds and Elder Scrolls: Oblivion. They all broke records.”
Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 recently got patch 9.0, the details of which you can check out here. Also check out details about developer Saber Interactive confirming a second year’s worth of content for the game.
