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[EverydayBeast]

What are some good examples of publishers meddling with developers I know EA worried a lot about their developers (dead space).

 

[feynoob]

Square enix and cdpr.

 

[Danjin44]

Dead Space 3, they literally destroyed great series just they appeal to more mass audience.

 

[adamsapple]

Mass Effect 3 was rushed out with an expedited development cycle thanks to EA, hence key story related things like Leviathan and an actual fucking ending were left as DLC.

 

[Angry_Megalodon]

Disco Elysium - ZA/UM: they have destroyed the studio for no apparent reason.

SSKJL - Rocksteady/Warner: exchange talent for diversity and get screwed in the process.

Larian breaking up with Hasbro, so no more Baldurs Gate or DnD from them. Though the actual reasons have not been made public, a bit of research on Hasbro may give some answers.

 

[Gambit2483]

EA and Star Wars Battlefront II. The outrageous scamming/gambling practices they were doing with the loot box microtransactions got the UK government involved. EA nearly destroyed the game until they heavily revamped the reward system by removing the microtransactions completely

 

[Killer8]

Retro Studios originally took tons of Nintendo's money to make 4 games for GameCube. The CEO drove around in Ferraris and nothing got done in 2 years. Nintendo of Japan wondered where their cash was going. They stepped in, cancelled everything not called Metroid, fired most of the employees in two waves and told the CEO to fuck off. Then Miyamoto, who didn't give a fuck about Metroid, said scrap third-person and make it first-person instead.

The rest is history, 97 on Metacritic.

 

[Gambit2483]

Retro Studios originally took tons of Nintendo's money to make 4 games for GameCube. The CEO drove around in Ferraris and nothing got done in 2 years. Nintendo of Japan wondered where their cash was going. They stepped in, cancelled everything not called Metroid, fired most of the employees in two waves and told the CEO to fuck off. Then Miyamoto, who didn't give a fuck about Metroid, said scrap third-person and make it first-person instead.

The rest is history, 97 on Metacritic.

Nintendo handled business for the betterment of it's game and development studio. I wouldn't exactly call that "meddling"...but I see your point.

 

[SlimySnake]

Days Gone - Sony execs didnt want Days Gone 2.
Suicide Squad - WB execs would fly over to Rocksteady offices and give presentations on why their next game should be a GaaS game. Though the final decision to go with gaas and choose the suciide squad IP was still made by rocskteady founders.
EA - Forced Anthem, Mass Effect 3 and Andromeda to launch before their fiscal year deadline in March.

EA and Star Wars Battlefront II. The outrageous scamming/gambling practices they were doing with the loot box microtransactions got the UK government involved. EA nearly destroyed the game until they heavily revamped the reward system by removing the microtransactions completely

iirc that was all DICE. EA management might have asked them to include microtransactions like everyone was doing back then but no one expected DICE to go that far.

 

[Evil Calvin]

Didn't Cyberpunk 2077 get delayed then forced out in the fall of 2020....when obviously not ready

 

[alexaxel99]

Comes to my mind two games: Deadly Premonition and Rule Of Rose. Both games were forced to include combat sections because the publishers were worried that without action scenes, the game would fail. Sadly, even with action scenes, both games failed (the story, atmosphere and soundtrack of Rule Of Rose is top level and Deadly is bizarre and funny, sadly the sequel is truly dissapointing and terrible).

 

[The ninja farmer]

Ea again.

Sending titanfall 2 out to fail by forcing the release in the week between cod and a battlefield (think it was 4, can't remember off the top of my head)

And then every publisher who released to make a date and not when the game was actually ready