Housemarque CEO Speaks Out Before the Release of Their Highly Anticipated Game Returnal

Housemarque CEO Ilari Kuittinen has spoken out in a blog post the day before the launch of their highly anticipated Third Person Roguelike Shooter "Returnal".

After 4 years in development, Returnal is just hours away from its release and Ilari Kuittinen takes us through their thoughts on the game and reveals some information on the games industry.

"In the age when game publishers are taking less and less creative risks, we are truly thankful to our publishing partner Sony, who has given us an opportunity to work on something very risky and has given fantastic support during the whole project. We are forever grateful for having this opportunity." Ilari says.

Kuittinen shares with us that while their 2017 release Nex Machina was reviewed well, sales didn't go as expected, leading the company to suspect that 2d Arcade games were dead.

This is where Housemarque decided to stick with their roots and translate what elements made their 2D games great and translate that to 3D.

Housemarque CEO Speaks Out Before the Release of Their Highly-Anticipated Game Returnal

"Shipping games is hard, shipping games that are bigger, more ambitious than the company has ever delivered before featuring things that we’ve never done in our previous games, like translating Housemarque arcade gameplay from 2D to 3rd person action and adding substantial storytelling elements, is even harder."

Many challenges were faced along the way from the transition to 3D while still keeping true to their roots, working with other publishers, and working from home because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

These challenges were accepted by the team and finally, after 4 years we get to witness the hard work of everyone involved in this unique and intriguing game.

You can read our review here: Returnal Review: Infinitely Satisfying

Returnal is out today and available exclusively on PS5.