From Naughty Dog's The Last of Us to Bungie's Halo, game developers have spent countless hours delivering titles gamers have come to love. But if we could have only one trophy-winning team of developers, which would it be?
Insider Gaming - "Ubisoft has cancelled yet another game, this time ending development on the Animal Crossing-inspired title Alterra."
Former Naughty Dog artist Gabriel Betancourt explains why the "sweet spot" for game teams is under 200 people and how AAA "factories" kill creativity.
There’s definitely some truth to this. When teams get too large, coordination starts to outweigh creativity—layers of approval, risk aversion, and tight deadlines can turn bold ideas into “safe” ones. Keeping a team under ~200 people sounds ideal for maintaining clear communication and a shared vision. That said, massive AAA projects also come with huge technical demands and expectations, so scaling up isn’t always avoidable. The real challenge is figuring out how to keep that small-team creativity alive inside big studio structures.
More than that, it's logistically untenable. Inevitably, when teams get too large, how do you keep tabs on accountability? I suspect this massive team size is a consequence of the perfectionism streak Naughty Dog has.
I wish we could have so many people working on something and it turns out great because I'm all for collaboration in spirit - the problem is too many people as part of the larger team and smaller units. Suppose for example that you have too many people in the art department; you will very often come up against fiercely competing visions for how things should look. That competitive vision will cause friction between team members, team doesn't work as a unit, the back and forth can further delay parts that the other departments are waiting for, etc etc.
A 200-person team says, to me, that we need to scale back game development. Even if it means we go back to PS2 era costs and scale, why not? Those games are still great fun, the budgets were in check, and you could literally break the 200-man team into like 10 20-man teams working on different projects.
HALIFAX (April 14, 2026) – Laid-off Ubisoft workers in Halifax have voted overwhelmingly in favour of a settlement with the video-game giant. The terms of the settlement, including the compensation employees will receive, is confidential.
I can't sit here and act like I know these workers financial situations. And I'm sure nobody wakes up WANTING to go to court. But for the sake of the industry, I wish some of these types of cases made it to trial.
Settlements allow companies to continue to do whatever abusive practices they do. While the trials (should the company lose) would actually force real changes for the better.
But again, I'm not in these workers shoes and I can understand them not wanting to risk it.
Naughty Dog in my opinion with Uncharted 2 and The Last of Us. Nintendo would be in second place because of Super Mario Galaxy 1 and 2. In third those developers who made Lost Odyssey and Blue Dragon.
Bungie won me with their great support in Halo 3.