Are you a fan of old Criterion Games? We have some exciting news for you today.
Criterion is rightly considered one of the most seminal developers for racing and driving video games. While they have most recently worked on the Need for Speed series, and also did support work for Battlefront and Battlefield games, they made their name on the Burnout games, an arcade racing game franchise that added a new layer to the genre with its physics and destructibility-based Crash mode.
Last year, five of Criterion’s veteran game developers – Matt Webster, Pete Lake, Alan McDairmant, Steve Uphill, and Andrei Shires left the company after the launch of the studio’s latest game, Need for Speed Unbound.
Today, the five have announced they have launched a new game studio themselves, named Fuse Games.
As reported by Video Games Chronicle, the studio is led by Matt Webster, who had previously been Criterion’s General Manager and EA’s vice president. Webster dates back to the days of EA founder Trip Hawkins, having worked on the original FIFA.
Webster shared this message with this press release:
“Fuse’s founding team and I love games and we love making them, and we’re driven to look at what’s next for us and for this wonderful industry.
It takes a great team to make great games, so at Fuse we’re striving to inspire and lead the next generation of game developers and game industry leaders.
With the founding team’s experience, we truly understand the value of building teams, and we will work to lead, grow, develop and fuse our people together with a clear vision that is guided by our shared values.”
The studio also revealed that they are working on a brand new premium AAA title. They describe this upcoming game as “fusing uncompromising attention to game-feel with blockbuster spectacle and player-centric innovations in social gameplay, self-expression, and creativity.”
While it isn’t guaranteed, it’s more than likely that Fuse will be working on a new racing franchise of their own. It perhaps could not come at a more opportune time, as their former employer, EA, had effectively shut down a racing franchise last year as well.
That franchise would be Project CARS, originally a fully independent racing game by Slightly Mad Studios. Slightly Mad Studios was acquired by Codemasters in 2019, and Codemasters was themselves acquired by EA in 2021.
While Slightly Mad Studios managed to get out three Project CARS games and build its own following, EA quietly closed the franchise after pulling all games from digital markets after their car licenses expired.
More than replacing Project CARS, or even bringing back Burnout, Fuse Games hopefully has a new idea for racing games for 2023. The genre could definitely use some fresh life injected into it.
