BioShock founder Ken Levine founded a new studio Ghost Story in 2017 with 11 senior developers to launch a story-driven immersive simulation game.
Officials revealed in 2018 that the game has been well developed for many years and has been playable, but Bloomberg today released an article saying that the current situation of Ghost Story Studio is not optimistic, its projects have undergone multiple restarts, and half of the founding staff have announced their departures.
Some developers say that Take-Two, the parent company of Ghost Story Studios, has given them a considerable degree of autonomy, and players are looking forward to their new works, and the reason why many developers have joined the studio in the past few years is precisely because they think Ken Levine can create great works.
It all seemed romantic at first, but it wasn't conducive to the development work and mental health of the employees, as Ken Levine's management style caused them a lot of pain. At the same time, the excessive trust that the public gave to Ken Levine personally when talking about the whole project made his behavior more uncontrollable.
Ken Levine introduced his philosophy in an earlier interview: Madness can do great things, and only greatness is worth fighting. But Mike Snight, one of the founders of Ghost Story Studios, revealed that Ken Levine's actions during the creative process led him to decide to leave with half of the founding team members — Ken Levine is said to often alienate or reprimand developers who fail to meet his expectations in front of other colleagues, and some of those who argue with him are fired, and some are "mysteriously no longer in the office."
Although Ghost Story Studios is only the size of an independent development team, Ken Levine wanted to create a "well-budgeted" AAA title. Their new work was initially put into development in 2014 and is expected to be launched in 2017. The game takes place on a space station, and players can choose between three factions to form an alliance or adversaries. Some developers recall that the 2016 version of the game had elaborate levels, rich 3D models, and complex dialogue systems that would change depending on the player's choices, and they thought that these jobs could not be completed in a year anyway.
At the same time, some developers said that Ken Levine often evaluates aspects of the game when it is not finished, and believes that they are not performing well enough, so they ask team members to change or give up the work at hand. And when the development crew spent weeks or even months making new game elements, Ken Levine would ask them to make major changes to imitate popular indie games like Dead Cell and Villains of the Void that he had just played.
Developers find this cycle of work that never gets results very frustrating, and feels like a hindrance in their careers:
Ghost Story's goal was supposed to revolutionize the way video games are told, but for so many years we've only had to watch other people achieve our wishes.
Both Take-Two and Ken Levine declined to comment on the Bloomberg article.