Super Dragon 64 wrote:I read that Pillars 2 wouldn't have been released without Microsoft's money and it still performed quite badly. This may put Obsidian on borrowed time but it also gives it another chance in that it looked like the company would have otherwise closed.
There's this too yeah. I'd rather they be acquired by MS than disappear entirely.
Meep wrote:Short-termism is the enemy here. There are execs pressured to show a return on investment quickly and that can end up destroying the thing they wanted in the first place. It's not really their fault I suppose. Managing a newly acquired studio properly and returning a sustainable return in the long term might be wise, but it's not much use to you if your shareholders - who know nothing about game development - get too impatient.
If what Chris Avellone's been tweeting recently is true, Obsidian has been mismanaged for years, including scamming devs, some of whom put their own money into the company to save it from going under, out of bonuses and royalties. Hopefully that'll disappear now, although I doubt it.