Neversoft has had the unenviable task of trying to match Harmonix and their Rock Band series over the past few years. According to one major member of the development staff, it had a negative effect on the studio.
“With Guitar Hero World Tour [2008] we kind of lost our souls a bit,” Guitar Hero project director Brian Bright lamented. “We lost that spark by trying to cater to everyone. We were in this arms race with our competitor [Rock Band 2], and in the end I felt like we sold a bit of our souls.”
After the release of World Tour, the team went to work on Band Hero, Guitar Hero Metallica, and Guitar Hero 5 while also collaborating with other studios making Guitar Hero spin offs; Neversoft expanded then contracted this year when things didn’t meet projections. “That definitely took our focus, everyone had split,” Bright said. “We did make quite a few games last year, and if you count up the sales of all of them it was close to how well World Tour sold. But the release of all those games split the marketing team s focus, it split our studio s focus.”
Source: Develop
