Avalanche Studios NYC Retrospective – An Ambitious Company Ruined by Bad Development Practices

I’ve wanted to write about this since the studio closed a year ago. Now that Contraband is also canceled I think it’s time, especially since Contraband was one of the big reasons why I left the company. The blog post turned out much bigger than expected though. There was a lot to get off my chest…

I worked at Avalanche Studios NYC from July 2012 to December 31st 2019, seven and a half years. I wasn’t there for most of Contraband’s development but it was obvious early on that it was going to be a very difficult project. If anything I’m surprised it lasted that long before being canceled.

The studio was born out of ambition. It failed because it could not deliver on that ambition. So this will necessarily be negative. But we had a good run and made two good games. I have so many memories and thoughts that I need to get written down somewhere, so lets celebrate the good and talk about the troubles.

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