Obsidian Entertainment Plans To Outlive Us All With Its Refreshingly Simple Business Strategy

Avowed developer Obsidian Entertainment has a goal to be around for at least 100 years--it's already a 22-year-old institution--and its current leadership team believes it can meet this ambitious goal by taking a pragmatic approach to developing new video games.

Speaking at the DICE Summit this week (via PC Gamer), Obsidian Entertainment VP of operations Marcus Morgan and VP of development Justin Britch explained how delivering new titles consistently and focusing on realistic sales expectations are part of its strategy to be around for another 78 years. As Morgan and Britch explained, this is part of their overall vision for the studio, with key elements revolving around staying "lean and invested" as the years tick by.

What this means in practical terms is that Obsidian is aiming for "mild success" as Britch defined it, while also ensuring that it has a manageable number of employees. Additionally, Obsidian isn't aiming to deliver games that feature groundbreaking visuals or an obscene level of scale, as the studio spends a considerable amount of time examining just how many resources it'll need to commit to a project before it's officially greenlit. This in turn allows the studio to be profitable, but not "super-profitable" with every game release.

It's worth noting that Obsidian is owned by Microsoft, a global company that makes a fair bit of coin every year through its multiple services. To its credit, Obsidian has been a workhorse studio for Microsoft and its Xbox division, as it has released The Outer Worlds, Grounded, Pentiment, and Avowed since 2019, and The Outer Worlds 2 is scheduled to arrive later this year.

While not every Obsidian-developed game is a critical hit, this lean-and-mean approach does appear to be working for it since it was acquired by Microsoft in 2018, and the studio aims to have a low turnover rate in the turbulent gaming industry. Last year saw some big-budget games from other studios bomb upon launch, with Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League and Concord being two notable examples.

Avowed launches on February 18 for PC and Xbox Series X|S--and is available right now to play if you purchased the Premium Edition--and scored 6/10 in GameSpot's review.