![]() ![]() He recalls a meeting regarding the company's financial performance for 2012, where the Eidos group of studios was expected to generate $65 million in profit. Square Enix has become notorious for declaring multi-million-selling games to be disappointments, and D'Astous reports this extended behind the scenes as well. It was predictable that the train was not going in a good direction" "It was a train wreck in slow motion, to my eyes, anyway. And that maybe could be one of the reasons why it wasn't as smooth as Deus Ex." With Thief, I didn't have that luxury to have a core group of people that had worked together previously, so I went to recruit strong people, very strong people, but they didn't have the opportunity to work together on previous games. He continues: "The Deus Ex development team was one of the strongest that I've assembled, and they were really united. ![]() And we were close, but just missing some finishing touches." "We did our best, and we struggled, and that's life in development in games," he says. The 2014 return of Thief was less well received - although D'Astous says that game "remains one of my favourite projects" and maintains an extra nine months could have produced a much better product. Legacy of Kain that was discussed, but wasn't as strong as Deus Ex and Thief."Ģ011's Deus Ex: Human Revolution, the studio's first release, garnered critical acclaim and put Eidos Montreal on the map. It was clear that we had great IPs that were sleeping on the shelf. "Montreal was there to save the back catalogue. "It was clear that the main purpose of Eidos Montreal was to increase capacity of production, or development capacity, within the group, because Crystal Dynamics was branded like a mono-project studio, as was IO Interactive," D'Astous explains. The studio was structured to have three production pipelines, kicking off with revivals of the Deus Ex and Thief series while helping Crystal Dynamics reboot Tomb Raider by handling the multiplayer component as its third project. "I hoped when Square Enix purchased Eidos in 2009 that that would change things."Įidos Montreal was founded two years before Square Enix acquired the UK publisher, and at the time was only the fourth major studio in Montreal, alongside Behaviour Interactive and teams from Ubisoft and Electronic Arts. And it was always underselling the quality of the games. We hit good numbers, don't get me wrong, but I always felt that the way to sell games that Eidos used were so traditional and conventional. "You could look at all the great games that Eidos did, and - apart from Tomb Raider back then, that was a whole different era - the Hitmans and all those could have been a six, seven, eight-million unit projects. Eidos has a great tradition of development teams, but they don't have superior knowledge of how to sell their games. "I left because things were missing at head office. "It was a trajectory that could be predicted," he tells. These messages, of course, referred to the shock news that Square Enix had sold Crystal Dynamics, Eidos Montreal and Square Enix Montreal, plus all the IP the trio of studios collectively held, to Embracer Group for a bewilderingly low $300 million.Įven though D'Astous was surprised by the price tag, the Eidos Montreal founder wasn't terribly surprised at how the studios' relationship with Square Enix turned out, saying the roots of its demise were evident even before he left the company in 2013. The shared tone was a request for advice and perspective: What's happening? Is it a good sign, or should we be worried? On May 2, 2022, Stephane D'Astous began receiving emails and phone calls from former employees. ![]()
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