Square Enix's Western studios were a "train wreck in slow motion"
James Batchelor
Editor-in-Chief
Tuesday 26th July 2022
Eidos Montral
Square Enix
On May 2, 2022, Stephane D'Astous began receiving emails and phone calls from former employees. The shared tone was a request for advice and perspective: What's happening? Is it a good sign, or should we be worried?
These messages, of course, referred to the shock news that Square Enix had sold Crystal Dynamics, Eidos Montreal and Square Enix Montreal, plus all the IP the trio of studios collectively held, to Embracer Group for a bewilderingly low $300 million.
Even though D'Astous was surprised by the price tag, the Eidos Montreal founder wasn't terribly surprised at how the studios' relationship with Square Enix turned out, saying the roots of its demise were evident even before he left the company in 2013.
"It was a trajectory that could be predicted," he tells GamesIndustry.biz. "I left because things were missing at head office. [Pre-Square Enix] Eidos has a great tradition of development teams, but they don't have superior knowledge of how to sell their games. And that was quite clear.
"You could look at all the great games that Eidos did, and -- apart from Tomb Raider back then, that was a whole different era -- the Hitmans and all those could have been a six, seven, eight-million unit projects. Deus Ex could have been that also. We hit good numbers, don't get me wrong, but I always felt that the way to sell games that Eidos used were so traditional and conventional. That it wasn't innovative. And it was always underselling the quality of the games.
Stephane D'Astous
"I hoped when Square Enix purchased Eidos in 2009 that that would change things."
Eidos Montreal was founded two years before Square Enix acquired the UK publisher, and at the
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