Warner Bros. Games is a sinking ship, but rather than trying to steer it back on course and get everyone to dry land, the captain is poking holes in the liferafts. Storied developers with decades of experience,like Monolith Productions, have been shuttered, while the talent behind some of the most iconic superhero games in history at Rocksteady have likewise been laid off.
In callous statements layered with corporate jargon, WB describes the historical games it leaves behind as “epic fan experiences”, as though they’re cheap rollercoasters at a local fair, throwing out so much potential tofocus solely on “Harry Potter, Mortal Kombat, DC and Game of Thrones”. It’s painful to watch as these studios are churned into a millennial meat grinder, but more than anything, I’m worried about TT Games.
If Lego Cuts Ties, What Happens To TT?
Earlier this month, Lego chief executive Niels Christiansen revealed that the company is“building up” its own development capabilitiesso that it can stop relying on third-party studios for future video game projects. That immediately set alarm bells ringing, as Traveller’s Tales — the studio behind some of the most iconic Lego games of all time, from Star Wars: The Complete Saga to Batman and Marvel Superheroes — hasn’t made a non-Lego game in 17 years.
Lego told TheGamer that it has not made a statement on whether it will end relationships with third-party developers, which is hardly reassuring.
Traveller’s Tales istheLego developer, so if Lego pulls away from third-party developers to make more in-house games, what happens to TT? The studio has a rich history of tie-ins dating back further than its collaborations with Lego, from Bram Stoker’s Dracula to Toy Story 2 and Finding Nemo, but tie-in games are a dying breed. Without Lego, it would take a completely new approach for the company to stay afloat.
The optimist in me says that Warner Bros. (which bought TT in 2007) is at least focused on IP right now, so there might be some wiggle room for TT to come out of this Lego kerfuffle unscathed, perhaps with a DC-themed platformer (or in a just world, a Haven sequel). But that’s assuming Warner Bros. is a reasonable publisher. Ha, good one, the optimist in me.
We’ve seen this wanton disregard for the talent under its wing again and again, as studios are shut down as recompense for the mistakes made by management, and with TT Games’ worth wrapped up in Lego, it’s hard to imagine the bureaucrats running Warner Bros. acting any differently when its time comes.
TT Games Has Been Oddly Quiet
Compounding these fears, TT Games has been oddly quiet for the last few years. Amidst the release ofLego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, reports surfacedalleging scheduled crunch and cruel leadershipfrom co-founder Jon Burton, dating back to the beginning of TT’s collaboration with Lego in 2005. This would certainly explain the cadence of releases, as a new Lego game was published every year for a decade until The Lego Movie 2 Videogame in 2019 — the bubble was bound to burst eventually, and Skywalker Saga may have been the pinprick to do it.
A lot of talent left the studio in 2021 during its development, including Burton and design head Arthur Parsons, who would go on to develop the disastrousFunko Fusion.Most of those who left were senior developers, leaving TT Games inan eerily similar position to Monolith Productions, which saw several long-standing devs leave the company to form their own studio under EA after the cancellation of its original IP, and before the announcement of Wonder Woman.
If leaks are to be believed, TT Games is now working on a new Lego Harry Potter or DC game, due sometime next year. That’s hardly an exciting prospect, as it either means we’re getting a fifth Batman game, or a re-adaptation of the Harry Potter movies, if not the failed Fantastic Beasts spin-offs. It’s not Wonder-Woman-development-hell bad, but it sure sounds like the studio is stagnating.
TT Games seems to be having problems behind the scenes, at the least, and is likely being hindered by Warner Bros’ limited focus on just four IPs (two of which aren’t kid or Lego-friendly), which is hardly ideal for a studio that thrives on a wide breadth of tie-in games. If Lego pulls the plug, it’s hard to imagine Traveller’s Tales lasting much longer, but I hope I’m wrong. It’d be a crying shame to see a 40-year legacy flushed down the drain, especially when so many talented devs have already been lost under Warner Bros.’s thoughtless leadership.
