The Finnish studio Housemarque has decided to step away from the arcade shoot'em up genre it is so well known for. According to Ilari Kuittinen, co-founder and CEO, the commercial failures of Nex Machina: Death Machine and Matterfall this year are the reason for the decision.
"It's bittersweet at this moment", Kuittinen says. "The era, the ten-plus years that we've been mostly working on smaller, downloadable, arcade-inspired console games has come to an end."
"While this genre will always hold a special place in our hearts, the industry is moving more toward multiplayer experiences with strong, robust communities, and it's time for Housemarque to move forward with the industry."
Housemarque's next game will be "something totally different", but it will hold true to the studio's core values: "gameplay first with first class execution".