Despite the Xbox exclusive's lackluster launch and poor post-launch support, according to a new rumor, Bethesda isn't willing to let the vampire shooter die just yet.
Poor, poor Redfall. A game not even its developers had any confidence in, shoved out the door to scathing reviews and left to die a slow, agonizing death as its player base dwindled to just 3 concurrent players earlier this month. However, if new rumors are to be believed, its publishers intend to stick with the game until the bitter end.
In a recently published episode of known industry insider Jez Corden's podcast Redfall and its most recent major patch came up in the discussion, and Corden let slip an interesting anecdote about a run-in he had with some Bethesda employees earlier this year:
I spoke to some Bethesda people, and - well, I say I spoke to, but I eavesdropped their conversation at the not-E3 events in LA this year, and they were talking about sticking with the game. Yeah, they were talking about sticking with the game for years and, you know, they want to give it a ‘redemption arc‘ and stuff like that.
Redfall: Can The Shooter Still Be Salvaged?
Corden seemed skeptical of whether Bethesda is still as determined to stick with the game as they seemed to be back then. And the skepticism is certainly warranted, with how poorly the game is doing these days.
And this isn't really a "No Man's Sky" or "Cyberpunk 2077" situation, where a highly anticipated game with a solid foundation was in a poor state at launch, but patched up with months of post-launch support. Redfall didn't exactly have a lot of hype behind it, and the issues most reviewers pointed out seemed to be more with the game's fundamental design than anything that could be easily fixed with a few patches.
Besides, according to Jason Schreier's exposé on the game's troubled development, the developer of Redfall, Arkane Studios, doesn't really exist anymore, with most of its Austin staff having left the company before development on the game was finished. Patching up a poorly received game is an uphill battle at the best of times, and I'm not convinced that the people still working on Redfall could win that battle.
Then again, every AAA game is a major resource sink these days, so it's not out of the question that Bethesda isn't willing to just throw out all the work already put into Redfall just yet. Either way, it'll be interesting to see how the game develops over the coming months.