Having shipped Civilization V, lead designer Jon Shafer recently announced that he has left Hunt Valley, MD-based Firaxis in favor of Stardock, the Michigan-based developer and publisher of Elemental: War of Magic and the Galactic Civilizations series. Shafer will be working on the Elemental series and future projects.
What could tempt the lead designer of one of the most storied franchises in PC gaming history away from a job at a major publisher's owned studio? And do the recent problems Stardock suffered with the launch of Elemental worry him?
Gamasutra spoke to Shafer this week about what led to this change, what his expectations are for working with Stardock, and how he feels about the fan reception to Civilization V.
"Sid Meier's Civilization V designer Jon Shafer and Paradox Interactive have "decided to part ways due to creative differences," Paradox has announced." - IGN
Who really needs big publishers these days anyways? Never been a better time to have smaller teams, making better games. Hopefully he moves on to something closer to his own vision.
Doesn't have to be bigger and/or flashier to be better, and given how "AAA" has been handling the industry the last few years? They aren't all too difficult to beat either.
I agree with you on this one, and most of the time they get much more creative freedom as well.
Dylan Cunningham writes: "there were no signs of life since November 24th 2015, with an extensive update detailing progress and the roadmap for the future. As well, Shafer made brief mention in this update of suffering from a personality disorder, though this is not framed as an explanation for delays, but rather described as something that motivates him to keep working on big projects like this. Mental health has been used as an excuse, valid or not, in numerous Kickstarter project delays before, but this was a new one on me."
Jon Shafer strikes Christian Donlan, Eurogamer, as a rather serious character - in photos, the 28-year-old designer looks like Woody the Cowboy's dutiful younger brother. For the last few years Shafer's been involved in a rather serious business, too. At Firaxis, he's crammed huge handfuls of human history into the controversial hexes of Civilization 5. Now, freshly incarnated as an indie at the helm of Conifer Games, his own micro-studio, he's holed up in a house in suburban Detroit with a few friends, and he's busy plotting the downfall of Rome.
