Meghan Morgan Juinio, former co-head of Santa Monica Studio and director of product development on God of War: Ragnarök, believes major game studios need to rethink their approach to development — starting with scaling down.
In a recent interview, Morgan Juinio said that large AAA studios and publishers should start investing in smaller, lower-budget projects — including double-A, single-A, and even indie-scale games — as a way to diversify their portfolios and take more creative risks.
“I do think there’s an opportunity for those big players to also look to diversify into double-A and single-A, and then perhaps indie as well,” Morgan Juinio explained. “What size, shape, or form does that take? I don’t know — but we need to look beyond the knee-jerk reaction of the pandemic and post-pandemic couple of years and really think about who we want to be, and what kind of product we want to put out.”
She went on to emphasize that while massive blockbuster titles can bring “potentially really large” payoffs, the industry can’t sustain itself solely on projects that cost hundreds of millions and take five or more years to produce.
Morgan Juinio’s comments echo a growing sentiment within the industry that the AAA model has become too risky and unsustainable, with development costs skyrocketing and layoffs continuing to hit even the most successful publishers. Smaller, focused projects — similar to the rise of mid-tier “AA” games like Hellblade, Remnant 2, or A Plague Tale — could be a path forward for big studios looking to balance creativity and financial stability.
