Microsoft is not planning to shut Redfall studio Arkane Austin
Xbox says it should have done a better job supporting the Bethesda studio
Microsoft currently has no plans to close Redfall developer Arkane Austin.
That’s according to Xbox Game Studios boss Matt Booty, who was asked by Axios if the studio will remain open following Redfall’s disappointing launch.
“That is the plan right now,” he responded. “They are hard at work on updates and continued content for Redfall.”
Following several delays, the first major Xbox exclusive from Bethesda released last month with various technical issues and reviewed poorly, garnering aggregate scores of 56 (Xbox Series X/S) and 53 (PC) on Metacritic.
Redfall received its first major patch on Monday, delivering “incremental improvements to gameplay, combat, AI, environment, stability, multiplayer, accessibility, UI, and various bug fixes”, according to Arkane.
“We’re grateful to see that millions of you have explored the quaint but dangerous open world of Redfall,” the studio said. “We recognize that we still have work to do, and we plan to address as much as we can, as quickly as we can.”
Booty claimed Redfall was getting “good play” in Xbox Game Pass. “It was a miss, but how much of a miss? I want to support them to be able to keep working to deliver the game they had in mind.”
“I feel accountable that we could have done a better job with Arkane,” Booty added, echoing recent comments from Xbox boss Phil Spencer.
Further reading
Redfall devs reportedly hoped it would be cancelled or rebooted by Microsoft
“We didn’t do a good job early on in engaging Arkane Austin to really help them understand what it meant to be part of Xbox and part of first-party, and use some of our internal resources to help them move along that journey even faster,” Spencer told Kinda Funny Games.
“We left them to work on the game… they’re a very talented team – I love that team, and I still do, and I will totally bet on them to do another great game. But when Matt Booty and [Zenimax president] Jamie Leder sit down, I think we can engage earlier with our different studios.”
