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Nuvendil on 17 December 2015
| binary solo said: I think him being Square Enix's head of product development and Western Studios does rather put him in the direct firing line of those execs who negotiated the RoTR deal. According to that announcement he was much more than just the head of CD and would thus have the "I was only following orders defence". It's always curious timing when an exec leaves soon after a game launches with lower than expected sales performance. If he was a major player at SE in favour of the RoTR deal then he deserves to jump before he's pushed. But if he's not the main culprit then he's being scapegoated and thus he's as much of a victim of an awful decision as Lara herself. But unlike Lara who never actually gets raped in the game, this guy may well have taken one up the arse so that the higher ups could deflect their own accountability for the worst exclusivity deal of the 8th generation. Even if this guy was a major force behind the deal, he may have written the agreement, but it was the SE board that decided it was a good deal and agreed to sign. Responsibility for failed major business decisions rest at the top, not the middle. If this guy oversaw the production of a crap game that earned a 45 metascore, then he would be responsible for making a shit product. But that's not what happened here. He made a genuine GOTY contender and you can't ask for more than that from the development studio. |
The first part of that last paragraph isn't exactly true. With a company as big as Square, it is common and necessary that the heads look to the more informed middle to give guidance. So the question really is whether he was that informed guy who championed it. If he came to the heads of Square with the deal and they asked him if it was a good deal and he sold him on it, than yeah it's all on him since he should know better. But we don't know so making drama out of something we don't know isn't really a productive discussion.
