Blasphemous Creators Explain Why They Didn't Want to Make an AAA Game

The Game Kitchen studio declined multi-million dollar funding from investors, explaining that they do not want to make AAA projects and lose control over the company.

The Game Kitchen studio, known for the Blasphemous series and Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound, revealed that it could have received multi-million dollar funding from foreign investors. However, the developers consciously rejected the deal to maintain independence.

In an interview with Vandal, studio head Mauricio Garcia stated that the team met with representatives from several investment funds, but after reviewing the terms, decided not to attract external funds.

According to Garcia, such funds typically expect the creation of large AAA projects or games-as-a-service. If a project does not meet financial expectations, investors do not look for alternative solutions, but most often simply close the studio.

The developers emphasized that they do not aim to release games with budgets of hundreds of millions of dollars. Instead, they want to make AA-level projects, maintaining creative freedom. According to Garcia, external funding would primarily mean "losing control over the company," without giving the studio anything truly necessary.

He also compared negotiations with investors to the atmosphere of the movie "The Wolf of Wall Street," noting that The Game Kitchen is not going to abandon its independent working model.