It’s becoming awfully cutthroat in the world of AAA gaming.
I suppose that sentence could be used to describe any level of funding within the games industry, or any kind of consumer product for that matter; in a world of influencers, reviewers, and online customer satisfaction, the money that investors place into things is arguably seeming to walk on an increasingly thin — albeit more lucrative — tightrope.
Even amidst record-breaking profits, companies around the world live in fear of a bad internet reputation, and walk on eggshells around their social media and PR output, like a group of trembling cows watching a farmer approach them with a red-hot branding iron that just says ‘cancelled’ (I can see how Ben Garrison makes his cartoons now).
AAA gaming is no exception to this. In fact, I reckon it sorely deserves to live in this fear, ever since I’ve seen giants like Activision Blizzard and Riot Games paying out tens of millions in harassment and discrimination lawsuits, from both within and outside of their companies.