The Guardian has certainly stepped up their games coverage as of late, including a devoted “games week” which, today, features an interview with Peter Molyneux, conducted by Rock, Paper, Shotgun’sown Kieron Gillen. The interveux focuses on the topic of big names in gaming, and why we don’t see more Miyamotos, Meiers, or Molyneuxs rising to prominence.
The interview suggests that, more and more, as developers increasingly fall under the umbrella of bigger publishers, the parent companies will want to keep the focus on the talent possessed within the team–not the talents of one or two key individuals. Ask a gamer who was responsible for Bioshock, and most will respond with Ken Levine. But, GTA4, likely the year’s biggest seller, is simply made by “Rockstar.” Says Molyneux:
“I don’t think publishers like there to be people attached to a certain franchise,” he says. “I don’t think they want Peter Molyneux known for the Fable franchise and they don’t particularly want a famous person attached to any franchise – because if that famous person leaves, they can take the franchise with them.”
Molyneux goes on to suggest a number of reasons why properly crediting the industry’s biggest talents is important — both in cases of under-appreciation, and over-appreciation.
“For a long, long time I’ve been credited unduly,” he says, “Not so much these days, because the role of a designer is much, much more understood. But for a very long time, I was way, way over-credited for many things.”
Molyneux shares his thoughts on both extremes, and methods of solving the problems, at the full interview, here.
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