Adrian Chmielarz co-founded the Warsaw-based studio Individuals Can Fly again in 2002, working on titles like Painkiller, Bulletstorm, and Gears of Struggle: Judgment. Then in 2012 he co-founded The Astronauts, which went on to launch The Vanishing of Ethan Carter in 2014.
The second recreation from The Astronauts is Witchfire, a darkish fantasy RPG shooter that entered Early Entry in 2024 and is now nearing its 1.0 launch. Forward of that, GamesIndustry.biz sat down with Chmielarz to debate Witchfire’s prolonged improvement course of, in addition to the benefits of working in small teams, the classes discovered from Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, and his worries round extraction shooters.
How lengthy has Witchfire been in the works?
Witchfire was began in 2017. We began making a brand new challenge in 2015 [after Ethan Carter], which was a science-fiction survival simulator – which by some means developed right into a darkish fantasy RPG shooter. In the center of 2017, we stated, “Okay, look, we actually like capturing demons in the head, let’s do this, that is in our DNA.” So when it releases, it is going to be 9 years.
Witchfire has already bought over 500,000 copies in Early Entry and amassed greater than 1.6 million wishlists: How have you ever managed to draw so many gamers?
I do not suppose it is one factor, nevertheless it begins with: that is Darkish Souls with weapons. And I feel that loads of individuals simply wished this for a very long time.
The opposite factor have to be visuals. For Ethan Carter, we marketed it by mentioning photogrammetry. There’s one thing that’s nonetheless magic to me [about photogrammetry]: you are taking loads of photographs of the object, put it into the software program, and it spits out a game-ready object. It is not so simple as this, however that is the gist of it.
So we marketed the recreation by displaying how we used photogrammetry, and our inside motto was ‘come for the graphics, however keep for the story’. And I feel in the case of Witchfire, gamers come for the graphics, however keep for the gameplay. The story will likely be added too, however for now it is largely the gameplay.
And the third factor is, I feel I’ve managed to arrange a workforce that’s pure expertise, ardour, and expertise. Expertise is the least necessary factor for me, however ardour and expertise is extraordinarily necessary.
When you’ve got a workforce that’s assured, it is a dying of ego – which may be very helpful for recreation making, since you are very open to criticizing one another. And whenever you see a critique of your work, you perceive it isn’t something in opposition to you, as a result of everyone on the workforce understands you are actually good at your job, however you are not excellent and you make errors.
So as a result of it is an egoless course of, you consider this explicit critique in a unique gentle, and we might be far more trustworthy throughout our improvement of the recreation.
One of the key issues about Witchfire is you’ve got acquired a really small workforce. I feel it is 27 full-time workers, is that proper?
It is 26 or 27. I feel it is 26, nevertheless it would not make a lot of a distinction, it is nonetheless a comparatively small workforce. And it is value mentioning that we solely grew to this dimension in the final two years. For many of the improvement, we had been solely 12 individuals, and we had been in a position to develop as a result of of the gross sales.
Workforce dimension is one thing that loads of individuals are speaking about in the business. We had a function lately the place the director of Assassins Creed Unity was saying that the “future lies in smaller teams.” I am questioning whether or not a workforce of round 30 is the superb dimension – as a result of we had a equally sized workforce for Clair Obscur, and No Regulation, the new recreation from Neon Big, is additionally being made by round 30 individuals. Do you suppose that is the candy spot?
I went to a builders convention in Poland, and I met with loads of buddies who’re homeowners of small studios or CEOs of gigantic ones, and I requested each single one of them precisely this query: “What do you suppose is the magic quantity?” And each single reply was totally different. It went from 25 to 100.
For me, the quantity would not matter – however whenever you cease recognizing individuals, that is whenever you’ve grown too massive. I bear in mind at Individuals Can Fly, after we had been 60-something [people], I nonetheless acknowledged everyone, and there was a connection there. However we stored rising, and in the future I noticed a man in the studio and I spotted I did not know whether or not he was a visitor or a newly employed developer – and he was really a developer. That is once I realized one thing was altering.
Clearly you may thrive as an enormous studio. I do not suppose Naughty Canine may be very small, for instance, and CD Projekt, they’ve giant teams. However I do agree that there’s something particular when you’ve got a workforce the place everyone remains to be mentally linked.
What’s that particular factor? Is it about the pace of decision-making, for instance?
Effectively, after we began The Astronauts, we stated to ourselves, “We might slightly downscale the challenge to the workforce, slightly than develop the workforce to the challenge.” Even when we had the cash, we would not do this. And the motive was we solely wished to work with the finest, as a result of throughout the improvement of Bulletstorm or Gears, I had a style of that, and then I believed, “That is what I wish to do for the relaxation of my life.” So I do not care if the challenge is massive or small, I solely wish to work with like-minded individuals: actually passionate, actually gifted individuals.
Valve hires individuals that may be self-organized. They do not actually need a producer with a whip as a way to create one thing. However when you’ve got passionate individuals, this comes naturally. You additionally take away loads of traction, since you simply point out one thing to the man, he will get it in a short time, you iterate, and then it is completed.
Final 12 months, I watched a video from Steve Jobs the place he defined how they made the first Macintosh. He stated that once they had been making the Mac, he determined to make use of solely A individuals in the workforce. Now, I do know it is a bit of bit brutal to divide individuals into A, B, and C – B being mediocre and C, you may guess – however I am quoting Steve Jobs. As a result of there have been solely A individuals, they realized how far more they had been having fun with their work and how significantly better it was, how a lot quicker it went.
“When you’ve got a small workforce, it is actually necessary that you’ve the finest individuals”
There’s this outdated saying that ten skilled troopers are as efficient as 100 amateurs, or perhaps a thousand, and that is fairly merely true. So when you’ve got a small workforce, it is actually necessary that you’ve the finest individuals.
Now, I consider all that – however final week I discovered that the guys behind Expedition 33 employed loads of newbies, individuals who did not make a recreation earlier than. And now my world view is ruined, and I do not know what to do. [NB: Sandfall’s COO and producer François Meurisse told GamesIndustry.biz that many of the team “were junior when we started”; director Guillaume Broche also told the BBC that the team was made up “mostly of junior people”.]
Right here we’ve a recreation that appears AAA to me, it is simply phenomenal in each side. There is a deep story, deep methodology of work, good gameplay, nice visuals and sound. It is a very coherent product. And you then hear that the core workforce was 30 individuals, half of which had been first timers. And I am like, “I do not know what to consider anymore.”
The top of the studio had a two-hour convention in France the place they had been discussing the course of of making this recreation. I have not watched this but, however I downloaded it, and I’ve transcribed the audio and translated it to English. And this video is ready for me, as a result of I must know the secret, as a result of it is completely loopy.
Clearly, we did not make Witchfire with 26 individuals, as a result of we use outsourcing, and Sandfall Interactive used loads of outsourcing – whenever you roll the credit on Expedition 33, it is 10 or quarter-hour lengthy. However nonetheless, that does not change the proven fact that the core workforce accountable for the overwhelming majority of the recreation and the concepts and execution is round 30 individuals, half of that are new. So it is the largest mystery in gaming proper now.
However whenever you really take a look at Expedition 33 from a designer’s level of view, there’s an unimaginable quantity of sensible choices that permit them to make a recreation that appears AAA, however is in actuality full of shortcuts.
I am going to provide you with two examples: one may be very straightforward, the different is extra complicated. The straightforward one is the enemies do not have faces. You do not actually give it some thought, as a result of the primary characters have faces, however 99% of enemies do not have a face that you want to animate.
A extra complicated one is that I could not perceive how such a small studio can produce such high-quality cinematics. However then whenever you watch it, 99% of these reduce scenes are literally theatre performs, which means the characters don’t work together with the atmosphere: It is only a individual speaking to a different individual. And which means they may document them regardless of what’s occurring with the ranges: They could possibly be completed in full separation. It takes loads of effort and time to match animations with the atmosphere, as a result of even an act so simple as shifting a chair to the proper all of the sudden turns into an excellent, tremendous difficult factor.
You typically hear recreation makers saying issues alongside the traces of, “blowing stuff up is straightforward, however having a personality sit down on a chair can take weeks of work”…
Completely true. For instance, when Naughty Canine launched the teaser for the new recreation they’re making, it appeared regular, however in actuality they had been displaying off as a result of the character is placing on a jacket in the first seconds. And that is one thing you do not do. You simply keep away from this. You simply reduce to one thing else and play the sound of any person placing on the jacket.
[Clair Obscur showed] what was lacking in AAA video games, which is discovering shortcuts, [rather than] brute forcing: “Hey, there’s 500 of us, however possibly if there’s 700 of us, then the recreation will likely be quicker.”
Once more, that is one thing we talked about in that interview with Alexandre Amancio. He stated throwing extra individuals at an issue would not essentially make it simpler to resolve that drawback.
Proper, proper. And going again to Expedition 33, that recreation is totally full to the brim with actually sensible concepts, however as a way to make these concepts, first you want to perceive how video games work. It’s a must to have this expertise as a way to discover these shortcuts. So apparently there is a couple of actually, actually gifted people in that studio who had been discovering all these methods to make this recreation seem approach larger than it truly is.
I assume there’s a lot of smoke and mirrors in that recreation, is not there? There’s heaps of corridors disguised as massive ranges.
Completely. And you’ll simply see they had been studying as they had been going. For instance, the opening ranges of the recreation are actually easy. I used to be like, “Hey, am I enjoying a PlayStation 2 recreation?” As a result of they’re actually small, actually tight, actually corridor-like. However you then get to the finish of the recreation and it is like, shit, man, that is spectacular. The extent is multilayered and massive, and it is clear they figured it out someplace in the center of making all these ranges – which by chance works very nicely for the participant, as a result of you’ve got this sense of progress, that the recreation grows with you.
Effectively, let’s discuss a bit of bit about Witchfire. Clearly you’ve got acquired a small workforce, and I ponder how a lot know-how has helped you create this wonderful wanting recreation.
We’re type of old fashioned in that I stated to the guys: “We’re not modifying Unreal Engine. With none change to the engine, you can also make 99% of what you actually wish to have in the recreation, and that 1% isn’t value the modifications and the complications that this might value.” So I do not suppose we’re utilizing something that’s not business commonplace, with the small exception of photogrammetry, as a result of we had been one of the first studios to introduce it to the plenty.
I feel photogrammetry remains to be magic, and we’re nonetheless utilizing loads of it. Rather a lot of Witchfire is principally our guys with drones and cameras.
It is fascinating that you just made the recreation with Unreal Engine 4 slightly than 5. Why did not you progress over to Unreal 5?
As a result of after we began, the engine was merely not mature sufficient. And there’s nothing actually that we would have liked for Witchfire. I am positive we’ll swap to Unreal 5 with the subsequent recreation, that is a given – or possibly it is going to be Unreal 6 by that point, I do not know. However for Witchfire, every little thing we wished to realize, we had achieved with the visuals.
I do know that Unreal 5 is getting far more environment friendly. There was an replace very lately that gave it a extremely important publish in body fee. However then once more, we’ll be releasing this 12 months.
It is a bit of bit late to alter at this level! And I do know once I spoke to the builders of Clair Obscur about switching to Unreal Engine 5 midway by means of improvement, they said it meant they had to recalibrate pretty much all the lighting, so it was fairly an enormous change.
Unreal Engine 5 is actually Unreal Engine 4 in disguise, so it isn’t as exhausting. However for instance, after we switched from Unreal Engine 3 for the authentic PC model of Ethan Carter to utilizing Unreal Engine 4 to launch it on PlayStation 4, it actually took us a 12 months and that wasn’t a conversion: We simply made the recreation from scratch, as a result of that was simpler and quicker.
So Unreal 5 in all probability would not have been the identical type of drama, however I am not likely prepared to seek out out!
I wished to ask you about extraction shooters as nicely. Witchfire has extraction shooter parts, and these video games have been huge lately, with Arc Raiders promoting tens of millions in 2025, plus Marathon is arising later this 12 months alongside varied different examples of the style. Do you suppose that is going to be a bonus for you, or an obstacle?
I feel it is a drawback, however not as a result of of the competitors. I feel some gamers may hear that there are extraction parts in Witchfire and suppose, “Oh my God, one more recreation that jumped on the bandwagon. Is it one thing that even matches this recreation? Is it vital? Did they add it simply because they wished to have it in the recreation as a result of it is common?” So all these sorts of questions that I am not having fun with very a lot, and that are painful to us, as a result of we added these extraction parts earlier than that time period was common, earlier than anyone thought that it might change into a subgenre.
And it wasn’t even [inspired] by another video games in the style – it was impressed by the very finish of that well-known Name of Obligation: Fashionable Warfare mission, ‘All Ghillied Up’. Principally, at the finish of it, you want to await an extraction, the helicopter is coming, however you want to survive for a pair of minutes. That part made an extremely massive impression on me, and that is what I wished to have in Witchfire.
Raiders of the Misplaced Ark is definitely one thing we carry up loads after we talk about the design of Witchfire. That opening of Raiders really radiates onto loads of issues in Witchfire, together with the extraction aspect. At first it is comparatively gradual, and you are planning forward. Indiana then executes his plan with swapping the idol, however then shit hits the fan, and it is escalation and it is chaos, and you want to survive – which is what occurs loads in Witchfire.
So when any person calls Witchfire an extraction recreation, first it pains me a bit of, as a result of it’d give the improper impression, however second, we’re not. We’re a hybrid.
We have now souls-like parts, we’ve Metroidvania parts, we’ve rogue-like parts, we’ve extraction parts. Really, we’ve so many alternative parts used collectively that at one level we simply introduced to the gamers that we’re calling ourselves an RPG shooter. And that’s actually, really the closest to what Witchfire actually is. So yeah, I am a bit of apprehensive that if any person hears that Witchfire is an extraction shooter, it should give the improper impression of what the recreation really is.
This interview has been edited for size and readability.