http://www.gamedaily.com/articles/news/thq-developers-best-friend/?biz=1
Bob Aniello, SVP of Worldwide Marketing at THQ, says that unlike EA and Activision, which have massive scale, THQ's size is just right for working with developers.
Posted by James Brightman on Monday, April 07, 2008
While independent developers continue to fold, THQ believes it has just the right scale to efficiently work with external studios. Bob Aniello, senior vice president of worldwide marketing at THQ, told Dean Takahashi of VentureBeat that huge companies like EA or Activision can only focus on internal development – something that THQ can use to its advantage.
"The issue is for the small independent developer. They are finding it harder and harder to break through with their ideas for games. Big companies focus on what is produced internally. The small developers need an advocate. At THQ, we balance that," commented Aniello. "We have great internal studios and we complement what they do with games produced externally, like Baja. We work very well with external developers. They see THQ as a friend of developers. We're one of the few that continues to focus on external development."
Ultimately, Aniello sees the massive scale of his competitors as big negative. "[Creation and destruction] is the history of our industry. You build scale. Scale becomes destructive. Then the creative talent leaves. We have the right scale. We are not too large or too small. That gives us a managerial advantage. When you look at all publishers, not a single one has mastered open-world games," he said.
In another part of the interview, Aniello also warned against movie studios making games on their own. "The skill set is so different from what Hollywood knows that it becomes a struggle for them. ... I believe the vertical integration of movie studios doing games will fail. Our experience with Pixar shows that a movie company working with a game company can consistently lead to better games. We can make, market and distribute games better than the movie companies," he stated.
Check out the full piece for more on casual games, social networks and other topics.
