Baldur’s Gate 3 publishing director rebukes “big budget = sh*t” but suggests “the public company model is broken”

Baldur’s Gate 3’s publishing director doesn’t think “big budget = shit” in video games, but did suggest that “public company model is broken” in the entertainment industry.

Responding to a recent interview with Dan Houser in which the GTA writer suggested the games industry “gets overly focused on making money” – which, in turn, was commented on by Duke Nukem 3D co-creator George Broussard – Michael Douse posited the issue is with “people in the trad ‘product pipeline'” rather than the budgets themselves, and that the audiences are “easier than ever” to find.

“Welcome to 2006,” Broussard wrote in a tweet, appending the quote from Houser. “Once games (the 360 era) started costing $30 million to make, vs $3-5 million in the 2000ish era, then jumped to $100-250 million – it was all over for originality and risk taking. Publishers can’t afford to take a risk with that much money.

“This is why you’ve seen AAA go to bi-yearly sequels on the top 20-25 IP and why you see so few new games. Nobody can afford to take the risk anymore.

“But this isn’t new,” he added. “It’s been the case for 20 years. It’s certainly WORSE today with the mega-costs of a tentpole AAAA game. So it will all crater as [people] refuse to keep buying sequels or adapt somehow. AAA tried service/GaaS games and largely failed and fizzled out.”

“I don’t think it’s actually true that big budget = shit,” Douse responded. “It just takes literally everyone involved to be on the same mission, which in 9/10 times is not the case. You can find an audience (even a necessarily large one) easier than ever now, but it’s people in the trad ‘product pipeline’ that are the problem.

“They either don’t understand that or see it as a risk to their business model, or they’re unable to parse that by investors,” Douse added. “The public company model is broken in entertainment at a time when it should be easier than ever to connect audiences to creators. Half of it is dim-witted self-preservation, and the other half is genuine lack of vision and leadership (or institutional stupidity).”

Houser’s words came as the Rockstar Games co-founder and Absurd Ventures founder broke rank with many of his industry peers, acknowledging that while he and his team are “dabbling” in AI, “it’s not as useful as some of the companies would have you believe yet.”