Insomniac: Creative Director on game output and PlayStation collaboration

Contents

Constantly developing and getting better
“Very happy” about the takeover

How does Insomniac Games actually manage to develop so many games? Creative director Bryan Intihar said a few words about this. The collaboration with Sony PlayStation was also an issue.

“Marvel’s Spider-Man 2” will be the third game that Insomniac has released on this console generation. The PlayStation studio previously delivered the standalone expansion “Marvel’s Spider-Man: Miles Morales” and the shooter platformer “Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart”.

In addition, the next PlayStation exclusive, “Marvel’s Wolverine,” has long been in the works. The announcement was made in September 2021, exactly two years ago. And beyond that even seems another PS5 AAA game to be in development! Insomniac is expected to contribute five games to the PS5 generation.

So the studio name definitely says it all: Insomniac means sleepless in German, which should not be a foreign word to the developers. But the Marvel-oriented studio actually doesn’t seem to have any problems with the infamous crunch. This is how President Ted Price explained at the end of 2021 how crunch phases thanks to effective measures can be prevented. It was previously said that when “Rift Apart” was created no crunch was necessary.

Constantly developing and getting better

Of course, the previous Insomniac titles aren’t exactly full of scope, but they do offer the highest quality. So how do the developers manage to deliver so many games?

Creative Director Bryan Intihar explains it this way: “We are constantly evolving and challenging ourselves to get better. Miles Morales had a better production process than Spider-Man 1. Ratchet & Clank had a better production process than Miles. We are constantly evaluating and improving. Have we perfected it? No. But we’re always asking ourselves how we can make the process better for everyone.”

The team also learns a lot from “Marvel’s Spider-Man 2”. However, the employees are always aware that they cannot do everything perfectly. At the same time, they are open to improvements and try to come to work feeling even better than before.

“Very happy” about the takeover

Insomniac Games has been part of Sony Interactive Entertainment since 2019. Before that, however, the PlayStation company had been working with the California studio for years. In any case, when President Ted Price announced the acquisition by Sony, Intihar was “very happy.”

Has anything noticeably changed as a result of the takeover? Intihar replies: “If anything, things have only gotten better since the takeover. I often forget that we are part of PlayStation. We have been working with them for so long. We’ve had the same producers for ages. And at the end of the day, they want the same things we do. They want to make great games and take care of people.”

The last topic was the global corona pandemic. “Marvel’s Spider-Man 2” was largely created during this time. Here, Sony helped the studio work remotely while still being “super productive.” Flexibility plays an important role here. Because despite the high amount of time spent on developments, every employee has family and friends that they care about.

“And if you’re happy outside of work, that should hopefully improve your life inside of work too. I’ve been here for over 15 years and there’s a reason why that is. It’s not just because we play great games,” Intihar concludes his statement.

Source: GamesIndustry

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