The achievements we saw from game developers, from indie to triple-A, were incredible. Here are the game developers that left an indelible mark on 201
Choosing 10 game developers who left their mark on 2018 wasn’t easy. The achievements we saw from game developers, from indie to triple-A, were incredible.
The way game developers are telling stories, serving their audiences, and helping their employees stay happy, healthy, and creative are evolving year by year. Looking back and seeing all the good stuff game devs have done this year reminds us how games are small miracles, and the people making them are some of the most gifted people around.
As always, our annual top 10 list of game developers isn’t necessarily made up of devs that made the “best games,” or the most financially successful (although that doesn’t hurt anyone’s chances of making the list). These are the developers and studios that left their mark on this year in a meaningful way, shaping the art and business of making games.
Below (in alphabetical order) are the 10 individual developers and studios, selected by Gamasutra’s writers, that exceeded our expectations and pushed creative, commercial, and cultural boundaries.
We’ve known that Warsaw, Poland-based 11 bit Studios is capable of a unique brand of mechanics- and systems-based narrative, particularly with 2014’s This War of Mine. This year’s Frostpunk iterates on that approach with outstanding results, making players care for the hundreds of displaced denizens of London.
But 11 bit isn’t on this list “just” because the studio released an outstanding game this year. 11 bit solidified its reputation for top-tier storytelling with Frostpunk, establishing a method of storytelling in games that 11 bit lead designer Jakub Stokalski calls “a values-driven game design approach.”
This practice uses conflict as the narrative base – which of course is a common approach, but 11 bit has formulated a unique way to make conflict an integral part to every aspect of a game’s design, and inject meaning into a web of intersecting systems and mechanics. 2018 saw 11 bit truly find its unique design voice, and other studios stand to benefit if they pay close attention.
Insomniac Games spent 2018 not only proving the success of its platform-exclusive game development model, the studio also took strides in standing up for the game developers who make their games possible.
Marvel’s Spider-Man is an amazing accomplishment for the veteran studio, and shows how the gameplay pillars they’ve honed over the years can be tuned toward an experience that balances playfulness and somberness with grace.
But while a lot of studios released some astoundingly-designed games this year, Insomniac Games is the one that stood up for its developers under a hail of online harassment. During both the puddle fiasco and the recently-resolved Sam Raimi suit snafu, Insomniac Games relied on the studio’s Twitter account to both try and transparently communicate with players about the state of their development process and push back against a growing tide of anger.
Other events in the game industry this year showed that when players use anger and fury to get what they want, a quid-quo-pro is established. “Get loud enough, and we’ll do what you want, even fire our talented staff.” Insomniac Games chose the opposite path and offered a firm defense of its employees rather then leave them twisting in the wind.
Lucas Pope, the developer behind 2013’s incredible border patrol game Papers, Please, has a knack for solving design problems, with fantastic results.
His latest effort, this year’s long-awaited “insurance adventure” Return of the Obra Dinn is quite a different experience from Papers, Please, but it still retains a clarity of vision that’s becoming a trademark of Pope’s games. And achieving that level of quality isn’t easy. When we talked to Pope earlier this year, he told us about the daunting task of scaling up the small Obra Dinn demo into the full game that launched this year.
