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Media Molecule co-founder and Dreams director Mark Healey has left the studio

Dreams got abandoned and now the old leadership is leaving. It's because either:

(1) MM is being shut down, or
(2) Jimbo and Hermen are rebuilding the studio so they can make proper games more consistently.

If it is the latter, I'm happy about it.

MM hasn't made a proper game in almost a decade, and they have been pretty useless to be honest. If they can see a resurgence and find their niche like Team Asobi / Japan Studios, it'd be great.
Agreed here.
 

Luigi Mario

Member
Japan Studio could have been reorganized though, they had talent there and most importantly shipped games.

MM... like, do they even have game dev talent anymore? They haven't actually made a game in a decade. We know they can build an engine creation tool wankfest thing that nobody cares about (except Mark Healey, maybe) but that's not a game. If you work in games because you like making games, and made say Tearaway why would you stay at that studio?
Friendly reminder that they were allowed to work on Dreams for at least 7 years. Just look at Japan Studio’s game output in the same timeframe (2013-2020).
 

nial

Member
Dreams was a great project, but sadly poorly managed. They should start making proper 3D platformers like Tearaway and Sony should be more supportive.
Should've cut this way before even looking at Japan Studio.
Why? Seeing any (good) studio shut down absolutely sucks, none of them deserve that.
MM... like, do they even have game dev talent anymore? They haven't actually made a game in a decade. We know they can build an engine creation tool wankfest thing that nobody cares about (except Mark Healey, maybe) but that's not a game. If you work in games because you like making games, and made say Tearaway why would you stay at that studio?
Most people don't know about this, but MediaMolecule was constantly creating games within Dreams.
 
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Japan Studio was Sony's second largest studio!
Then it started shrinking slowly and suddenly it was almost erased.
maybe that's what's been Happening to Media molecule. Sony slowly letting employees go or people leaving, no hiring. I've seen some reports MM had up to 200 employees (contractors etc) height of their game development to only 25. wtf.
 

GHound

Member
I feel Dreams was a large misstep and waste of resources at the end of the day. Not a terrible idea, but ultimately not a good product.
 

Ar¢tos

Member
maybe that's what's been Happening to Media molecule. Sony slowly letting employees go or people leaving, no hiring. I've seen some reports MM had up to 200 employees (contractors etc) height of their game development to only 25. wtf.
Media Molecule had 30 employees when they started Tearaway, when Dreams started they had 80. They use a lot of hired "help", but their staff hasn't changed much.
Japan Studio on the other hand, had hundreds of people, it bled money, while MM never costed much to keep running.
They will just stay as another AA game studio, like PixelOpus.
 

Edge Lord

Member
I think dreams was an experimental effort from both Sony and MM,they tried to ceate a long lasting product for gamers who play Minecraft mainly.
Maybe it didn't pay off the way they wanted to. It also hasn't got a ps5 patch iirc.
 
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reinking

Gold Member
Yeah. It's nothing new...
...unless that happens with Xbox studio.

Then it is doom & gloom and mismanagement :messenger_tears_of_joy:

Also. Looks like this guy is going to Rare? He liked a tweet that "welcomed" him there.

4 co-founders or directors leaving in 2 years is perfectly normal :messenger_winking:
I can’t determine e if you are the victim or the bully…


Good luck to Healy. MM has done some good work and been given freedom to experiment. I hope he finds creative freedom wherever he lands.
 

DrFigs

Member
They should start making games people want to play. It's insane they sunk this much time into Dreams in the first place and produced nothing else.
 

sainraja

Member
I like Media Molecule and loved most of their games. I hope they are able to make a full come back. Shame they lost another founder!
 

kuncol02

Banned
I feel Dreams was a large misstep and waste of resources at the end of the day. Not a terrible idea, but ultimately not a good product.
It was good piece of software killed by abysmal bussines model. What idiot thought that it's good idea to lock software like that not only to specific platform but also make it paid product (and not only pay to create but also pay to play)?
 

GHound

Member
It was good piece of software killed by abysmal bussines model. What idiot thought that it's good idea to lock software like that not only to specific platform but also make it paid product (and not only pay to create but also pay to play)?

"And so then we were like 'hey, you gotta pay for that' and everyone just just looked at us like we were out of our minds."
jim-ryan-laughing.gif
"Those were some good times."
 
Yeah. It's nothing new...
...unless that happens with Xbox studio.

Then it is doom & gloom and mismanagement :messenger_tears_of_joy:

Also. Looks like this guy is going to Rare? He liked a tweet that "welcomed" him there.

4 co-founders or directors leaving in 2 years is perfectly normal :messenger_winking:
Calling out Sony strawmen for contradicting themselves while contradicting himself in the name of Xbox in the next post.

Both of which get big thumbs up from CatLady CatLady . Some things never change.
 

Godot25

Banned
Calling out Sony strawmen for contradicting themselves while contradicting himself in the name of Xbox in the next post.

Both of which get big thumbs up from CatLady CatLady . Some things never change.
I'm not contradicting anything. I don't think it's a big deal at all. People come and go.

It's just...people around here tends to make it bigger than it seems....
...when they are talking about XGS :)

So...keep the same energy? I guess
 
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I'm sure Dreams was good at what it did, but it was also obvious before it came out that no one actually wanted it. Always seemed like an elevator pitch where everyone assumed someone else was going to send the 'no thanks' email but no one ever actually did so it ended up releasing by accident.
 
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SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
I dunno but a google search generally hasn’t been reliable when I’ve tried finding this info in the past
They had 85 devs when they launched Dreams. Contracted studios shouldnt count. every game uses them.

sony japan was definitely bigger. not sure now that it was shutdown/gutted/merged into asobo studios etc.
 

bender

What time is it?
While their games didn't click with me, I always tip my hat to MM for creating passion projects that gave others a doorway to creativity and also Sony for investing in that vision even if it wasn't the most commercially viable usage of that investment.

Dreams coming to completion is probably part of the decision and maybe Sony has different plans for MM moving forward, but speaking of passion projects, I think a lot of the reason we see creatives leave is so that they can work on smaller projects with smaller teams that are more agile.
 
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Rac3r

Member
That’s a shame. I always considered Media Molecule to be an elite studio. Great body of work. Hopefully their next project is strong, despite Healey’s departure.
 

Varteras

Member
Dude spent 8 years directing development on a project that went nowhere 3 years after release. The specters of Peter Molyneux and Lionhead were felt. For anyone not aware, MM was formed by former Lionhead staff who worked with Molyneux.

Project Spark failed spectacularly. What possessed MM to think they had a better idea? The quality of their work is undeniable, but that doesn't matter if you spend an entire generation to make something that flops. MM is looking at a decade since their last actual game, Tearaway, which was also considered a commercial failure, even after they ported it from Vita to PS4.

LittleBigPlanet 2 was the last time the company created a commercially successful product, and that was back in 2011. Time to hand the reins off to someone else.
 

Ar¢tos

Member
Dude spent 8 years directing development on a project that went nowhere 3 years after release. The specters of Peter Molyneux and Lionhead were felt. For anyone not aware, MM was formed by former Lionhead staff who worked with Molyneux.

Project Spark failed spectacularly. What possessed MM to think they had a better idea? The quality of their work is undeniable, but that doesn't matter if you spend an entire generation to make something that flops. MM is looking at a decade since their last actual game, Tearaway, which was also considered a commercial failure, even after they ported it from Vita to PS4.

LittleBigPlanet 2 was the last time the company created a commercially successful product, and that was back in 2011. Time to hand the reins off to someone else.
I prefer Tearaway to LBP/Sackboy, I think it has more charm.

If MM can't create proper games anymore, they can always be useful remaking/remastering old Playstation games, like Puppeteer or Lemmings (does Sony even remember that they own Lemmings?).
 
I think Dreams is about the only Sony game over a year old to not appear anywhere on PS Plus Extra. It seems like they honestly want people to forget about it.
 

Rac3r

Member
Damn didn't realize another one of the co-founders left last year (Kareem Ettouney), and obviously Alex Evans was the biggest loss a few years ago. It's likely they were just burned out or wanted a change of scenery after 15+ years at the studio. Hopefully they have young talent that are ready to step into leadership roles.

It'll be a bit ironic if Healey does end up at Rare. MM was founded with the intent to keep the smallest development team possible (to avoid studio bloat). Rare is like 4x the size of MM.
 
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Varteras

Member
Damn didn't realize another one of the co-founders left last year (Kareem Ettouney), and obviously Alex Evans was the biggest loss a few years ago. It's likely they were just burned out or wanted a change of scenery after 15+ years at the studio. Hopefully they have young talent that are ready to step into leadership roles.

It'll be a bit ironic if Healey does end up at Rare. MM was founded with the intent to keep the smallest development team possible (to avoid studio bloat). Rare is like 4x the size of MM.

I think I recall an interview with the studio head a year or so ago where she talked about headcount. It sounded like MM doubled in size relatively recently from where they were for a while (50 or so). I think she said they had about 96 staff at that time and MM has been hiring. Sounds like there was an internal shift to grow the studio. Their ambitions clearly couldn't fit in the size they tried to maintain. This may have contributed to some of these old guard leaving.
 
I'll never understand closing down a studio that put out Gravity Rush 2. Its still one of the best looking PS4 games. Its not like they were totally incompetent. I just disagree.
It was a huge studio made of multiple smaller teams. The team responsible for gravity rush was the only team dismantled, cause it released duds.

Studio Japans 3rd party team was turned into Xdev Japan. Rise of Ronin would have been a “Studio Japan” labeled release. Studio Japan was renamed Team ASOBI. Team ICO had already left as Gen DESIGN.
 
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