If Things Don't Turn Around for DON'T NOD, It May Face Closure in a Matter of Months

Not gonna lie, the only game I knew from them was Life is Stange, never even heard about the other ones, didn't even knew they existed at all.

But now that I know these games are a thing and I watched some gameplay, the only thing I have to say is: no wonder they are going under, these games give me the vibe of something I would get from those 1001 demo CDs back in the early 00s.

I had to wiki what games they have done, and every single one of them had "mixed reviews" except for Life is Strange. So they're basically like Super massive games, caught lightning once but could never do it again.

I didn't know Aphelion was out. Was it any good?

@KidRyan All those recordings took mad amounts of SDD space too!

The article unfortunately has some word vomit and mistakes in there regarding the financials, but in short:

If you have a turnover / revenue of 6,1 Mio. Euro but at the same time an EBITDA of -4,3 Mio. Euro then things are very very rough. Cash-Flow is the more decisivie part, as depreciations (the capital D in EBITDA) can really make or break a P&L for a developer and publisher due to ongoing developments, assets and so on. But this is really horrible.

They really need the cash to pay the bills for the time being but that would not change their operating situation. That's really unfortunate. Their games are always with very clear intent and rather unique - But that also makes them a hard sell.

I really wish they would have made a sequel to their best game Vampyr before possibly going out of business

I would consider myself a DontNod fan having played I think pretty much every game they've made aside from Twin Mirror. I have no interest what so ever in Aphelion, I have no idea who it was marketed towards. I have no idea if its more akin to Vampyr/Banishers which I would love or a more narrative focussed title like the adventure games. Its a non-entity, black hole of a title. An anomaly sent out to die.

Wow, what an unexpected response in the comments, I thought they would still be relatively well known as the creator of Life is Strange, Jusant was a mild success upon its release as well, actually so was Vampyr. I suddenly feel very old.

Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden and Lost Records: Bloom & Rage was probably something they had high hopes for, but unfortunately those two games just was not it👀

Dont nod made some quality games

Remember me
life is strange
tell me why
vampyr
banishers ghosts of new eden

the problem has been their recent games

harmony fall of revere
jusant
koira
lost records bloom and rage
the lonesome guild
aphelion

these have all missed the mark and havnt been as good as their previous games and no studio can survive that many misses unfortunately

I found Banishers to be really enjoyable in the AA market. But I think that they pinned al lot of hope and hype on Bloom and Rage but I found that to be boring and tedious, and hated the writing and characters, and not just because they were very woke, but they didn't have much personality despite them over trying. Unfortunately Don't Nod games sit in the very AA bracket and due to the amount of games (especially AAA) releasing, they are always overshadowed. I think the only games I bought of theirs over the years was LIS, and that's because I wanted the remastered versions. All of the rest i have had through ps plus from ps3 onwards

Shame. I really enjoyed banishers..top game.

Pity, as I really enjoyed Remember Me (PS3) and Vampyr (PS4).

in more recent times they have made games that the majority of people aren't interested in and investors don't want to waste money anymore after the COVID bubble burst.

Rooting for them as the OG Life is Strange people and the terrific Banishers Ghosts of New Eden (easily a top 20 PS5 game), it’s a shame to keep reading things like this.

Banishers was good for a double A title, although I didn't finish it. The bulk of their titles I've never heard of though. Just the sad reality that it's a saturated market and if you don't make something better than average you get lost in a sea of new games .

They're a studio that never liked to be pinned down, always trying something new. Which on the one hand is really cool, on the other it means they don't have any easy money franchises to define them, or sequels they can perfect an idea with.

They gave LiS away, Vampyr just missed the mark through poor advertising, Jusant was an Indy hit but it's time has passed with similar games out now.

I think they need to reign things in a bit, choose a lane and really hone it, maybe release a really refined sequel to Vampyr or Banishers (probably new characters, same world). Iron out what didn't work, build on what did.

@Hyena_socks agreed. Always moving on to something new probably isn't the safest financially.

I enjoyed Vampyr and Remember me, wished both IPs got sequels and or continuations

Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden is one of my favorite games of all time. Shame Don’t Nod wasn’t big enough for people to give it a shot.

I've only played banished but I enjoyed it

The only game I've played from this team is the OG LiS, which I did enjoy at the time. Haven't touched anything of theirs since then. Their games seem to be geared primarily toward women--young women of a certain political proclivity--and I'm just not interested. Obviously I'm not alone.

Remember Me was one of my favorite surprises on Ps3. Super cool hand to hand combat, awesome soundtrack, cool world (minded me of slight cyberpunk/ff7) and just a really solid villain. It did NOT score that well. I never understood why. Really a great game and memory for me. Shame to see them go

Vampyr and Banishers were great horror adventures. The former had true choice and freedom alongside mysteries and investigations, while the latter brought a ghost story with some great choices about whom was guilty or not. Great stuff.

I really liked Banishers and Lost Records, alongside some of their earlier work like LIS. I really hope people get to keep their jobs, and this studio gets to keep making games.

@get2sammyb and the "cream" of the top is already mostly taken by cod, some sports games and gta5. And nowadays most people do not buy games any more but rather spend their money on new skins for one of the popular live service games nobody likes.

I’ll always have Remember Me and Banishers. I haven’t played anything else recent from them. (backlog is drowning me as is) Good luck to the devs.

@For-Kier spoken like someone who has totally played them

@gaston my thoughts exactly.

One of my favourite devs - enjoyed everything I've played by them. Hopefully they'll survive and keep creating interesting stuff

Their last alright game was Remember Me on PS3, I'm surprised they lasted this long.

Quite liked Lost Records and the first two Life is Strange - but I'm a sucker for point and click.

Bit confused about some of the comments pointing to vague reasonings like aiming at women/wokeness (sigh). Meanwhile Ubisoft, EA, and pretty much every other studio are sacking left right and centre and getting a free pass.

There are a lot of games and we're living in a post pandemic economic world that's absolutely rinsing the gaming industry.

Their promotional team sucks. Banishers, Jusant and Lost Records are all worth your time but barely anyone has heard of them.

People are Reddit are saying they made "too much new IP" and should've focused on sequels.... that people would also complain about.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't!

It's a shame that we would lose one of the top developers for the Life is Strange type of games. Granted I liked every single Life is Strange game better than Lost Records, as I was pretty disappointed in that as I never could connect with any of the characters, but it would still be a shame.

Ghosts of New Eden was a wonderful little gem.

I really am quite a fan of DontNod games for the most part, only trouble is out of my circle of peers I seem to be one of the few not the many.

Though I would consider it a great shame to see them go, I wouldn’t be remotely surprised.

Hope they can stay around, I mean if the Commodore 64 is making a come back with new hardware, surely DontNod can stand a chance.

@Sunraku 100% agree that studios should always hold on the ownership on their IPs (Like what Shift-up did with Stellar Blade), but they thing is sometimes these IPs/games wouldn't exist without funding - prime example of this would be Hell Divers 2

Unfortunately the majority gamers are brain dead and like playing mindless slop. Anything that has anything remotely resembling a story gets overlooked for repetitive trash.

Would have said expect their games on ps+/gamepass on the next fee months, that's the easy money route but looking at their titles at the end of thr article, they've already had that sweet subscription money.

I can't say I remember any of these games. Why weren't they more involved in the Life is strange franchise?

An impressive record of games no one ever heard of... sarcasm

Ghosts of New Eden was a good battle system of way from being a great game. It was still very fun but fights were so tedious and boring and got in the way of the fun detective/mystery narrative going on.

I bought 3 games from that list of releases but only played and finished one of those games. It was ok, but I didn't really like it that much. Still need to play the other games I bought.

This is really sad. Playing Banishers currently and loving it! Also quite enjoyed Jusant.

Banishers is really good, if too long. I love the relationship between the main characters. I'd highly recommend it as almost a AA modern God of War game.

I was really excited about Lost Records, but it didn't click with me. I may go back to it at some point but I feel like it took too long to get to the big reveal. I almost feel like it would have benefited from being 4 or 5 episodes like LiS, rather than 2.

I haven't played any of the others, though I was interested in Aphelion.

It would be a shame to lose them, did their own thing and the games were pretty polished which I respect. I loved Jusant & Banishers was great too!

I also recommend Jusant.

Jusant was lovely.

This news, sadly, isn't a surprise. All the tech capital is going into AI at the moment, and in a higher-interest rate environment, games just aren't getting a look in with investors in the same way they were pre-Covid.

AA is tough as hell at the moment. If I were them, I'd consider partnering with someone who has an established IP to try and leverage that. Yes, you have to pay to use their IP, but get the right one and there's a better chance that people will show up for the game.

Hopefully they get Capcom on the phone and work out a deal to Remember Me Remastered or a definitive edition with some extra fixes. That game is so underrated, still play it to this day on Steam.

@guacguacboo problem is (almost always) marketing not the combat (in the case of Banishers). Look how much press Blood of Dawnwalker is getting and very much all comments reflect what you just said about Banishers, "bad combat gets in the way of storytelling" but heres why, good marketing... "a game made by Witcher 3 dev"... will sell no matter how bad the combat mechanics or enemy diversity is.also its a 9/10 on Steam, only IGN seems to have bashed on em... Just bad marketing which resulted in poor sales.

Vampyr is worth a replay as it was patched for 60fps on ps5! If only i had time to finish it. Sometimes i miss the lockdown periods.

Their best game was Remember Me. Too bad they never worked on a sequel.

Remember Me is the only game I care about from them so far. Life is Strange is cool but not really my thing, the others I barely even heard of at all. Maybe have but not enough to remember very well.

I checked and I have heard of Banishers, didn't play it but I did think it has some interesting ideas. Aphelion I have heard of but know even less about. The rest I maybe did see trailers at conferences but they weren't very memorable.

The new one they are working on is fair but depends how far it goes.

I'll look at the others to see if my thing or not but most might not due to how 8th/9th gen has been going for not very exciting gameplay (yes I enjoy adventure genre games, Indie wise I think they stand out where others fail, they aren't really my thing but I respect them story telling/artstyle wise at least. But they still vary of story, characters, settings, themes, and general mechanics whether FMV games which been getting into the past year mostly a few from South Korean, China, Turkey and the UK, visual novels mostly from Japan though, or walking and other movement to tell a story which I don't play, I do enjoy them for puzzle games as obstacle course puzzle games but only here and there, many on PSP were good but modern ones not played as many, whether playing as a human, a cube or whatever else, character doesn't matter only gameplay).

@Oram77 Agreed, though Shift Up already has a very successful mobile game to fall back on regardless but yes companies being smart about it when getting funding/making agreements.

That or yes getting funding other ways.

But yes, whatever deals that can be made with some publishers. Looking at Dotnod's games many I didn't even realise were them, they have tried many angles it seems so that's something I didn't expect so can't judge them for that.

Some trailers I forgot about and some may be my thing I just wasn't looking for them at the time.

Some studios play it too safe (annoyingly, passion, business deal or understandably) regardless of publisher so who knows of deals, meetings, development/what others say that is convincing for project potential I guess. Shrugs.

AA's are holding on and I think are making great stuff but as a gameplay focused type I'm also very picky since 2017 collecting/paying more attention, despite exploring every genre to learn them fresh.

But with me getting into FMV games, I may try and get back into some action adventure games, just knowing which ones to do.

I liked Echoes of the End but already helped 2 family members play through it. XD

Still got Remember Me on PS3 to play of Dotnod's and find it brilliant.

Got Banishers but just not got much interest in 9th gen really. Maybe in a few years might pick up the disk family have and give it a go.

Most trailers look eh to me in conferences and showcases as it is. Indies 'vary' in what they do to compete in any genres/skills/inspiration/intention.

@get2sammyb But besides trailers, story, flashy presentation and more what do players want? Comment sections, polls, vocally, industry data?

Do they want 'gamey' games, movie like experiences or familiar experiences? Something with emotion, hypothetical questions, something relatable, something with action? Easy to play? Puzzle solving? Skill trees? Other engagement system design?

Exploration of themes? Gameplay that's accessible? Gameplay with more out there mechanics? Clearly not as the industry shows only on occasion and others call them 'PS2 era' or otherwise design which i find insulting. I'd rather play fun mechanics then story telling and generic movesets but most play story/presentation easily to spot, other things that go further who knows.

I'd rather write pages for game wikis of legacy games (odd current era but what of FMV games I've enjoyed the past year exploring for the first time XD) then play games sometimes.

What game aspects do people really seek? Has a poll been done on that in a while? I think so but I forget.

Sure we know sales data, but I mean what else do people really seek? Easy multiplayer experiences with not much thought put into them and bland systems for easy money?

Singleplayer wise we see all sorts but a lot of cut backs that annoyed me and made me want to play them less that's for sure to explore all genres in singleplayer then shooters, action adventure or RPGs I find rather unappealing nowadays. Let alone more particular genres cutting back ideas too.

Management has been clear, audiences they intend to sell to and 'gameplay', I barely find hardcore that even care they only want graphics/story, yet I can't even stomach them they are so boring to play but that's just me.

Data shows only so much, what do people genuinely think though?

Hardcore, casual and so on not just investors and such?