The SteamWorld franchise started in 2010 with a tower defence game made specifically for Nintendo DSi, and since then, it has grown to a total of six games in five different genres. During Hamburg Games Conference (via GamesIndustry.biz) this week, Thunderful co-founder and SteamWorld universe director Brjánn Sigurgeirsson explained why they are moving between different game types like this.
He revealed that his studio (called Image & Form back then) once made over 60 titles of edutainment games as a work-for-hire developer. The studio didn't want to to this anymore:
"We were very tired of that. We were terrified of making the same type of game over and over again. So we really wanted to have the freedom to make the games we wanted every time. Our entire future was riding on SteamWorld Heist. If that game performed, it would mean that we had proved our point and we could actually be free to make any game we wanted from that point on."
Fortunately, this paid off and since then, the series has been known for never repeating itself, and last year we got a city-builder called SteamWorld Build. Unfortunately, it didn't sell as well as expected and the flow of new SteamWorld titles have slowed down considerably (the one before that was SteamWorld Quest: Hand of Gilgamech from 2019). So perhaps the studio should try to deliver sequels to their most popular games in this universe, but they still seem hellbent on continuing doing new stuff:
"Who knows what the future of SteamWorld looks like? A robot dating sim? Or a racing game, or maybe a first-person shooter? The important thing is we have set ourselves up to be able to lift the curse of making the very same game over and over. All we need to continue to do is to make good games in the series."
It was recently revealed that SteamWorld Headhunter seems to have been cancelled, but we really hope that Thunderful can get back on track with these lovely games again, no matter which genre it'll be next time.