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For a studio forged to support an existing game, Evil Empire has come a long way. The team started life as four co-founders working on Dead Cells while the rest of Motion Twin went on to build Windblown. Success saw it grow to 15 developers at first, and then eventually 50 with the launches of The Rogue Prince of Persia and, most recently, Castlevania: Belmont’s Curse. Speaking to CEO Thomas Pfeiffer and Head of Business Ben Laulan, I ask what the future holds next, and whether they ever look wistfully back.
It’s been just over two years since the team called time on the game it was born to make, so does Evil Empire ever feel the pull to return to the roguelike that started it all? “I think we’ll always miss Dead Cells,” Laulan responds, “because it was the game that allowed us to found Evil Empire, you know, and allowed us to be where we are today with this incredible team.” Both Pfeiffer and Laulan were at Motion Twin for several years prior to the creation of the spin-off studio, which has since evolved into a beast of its own.
“I think there is a part of us that will always say, ‘Oh we miss having fun with Dead Cells,'” Laulan continues. “But now we are looking at the future, you know, and we have many productions on our hands. We have this live-ops division that we are pumping up with Brotato and potentially other partners. So yeah, I guess it’s in-between. We miss it; it’s more nostalgia, I guess.”
“We miss it, but [moving on] was also the opportunity for us to consider doing something on our own,” Pfeiffer tells me. “It’s part of our story, so there is some frustration a bit here, but still, we are happy to find a way to create our own games.” He smiles: “Maybe the dream will be to create a live-ops team for an IP we created ourselves at some point, have fun with new teams and live the dream with our own product, or maybe another game we are making.”
“To be the reason for the creation of the new Evil Empire-like that does support for our game,” Laulan chimes in, sparking a burst of laughter. “Yeah, it would be weird,” Pfeiffer responds, “but interesting to consider. But no, it’s okay,” he says of moving on from Dead Cells. “It was a good moment.”
After Prince of Persia and Castlevania, I ask the obvious question: does the team have a ‘dream collaboration,’ one it would snap up in a heartbeat if it were offered? The pair immediately grin at one another. “Yes, and we are already working on it,” Laulan says, laughing. “We’re too early to talk about it, but yeah, we’re extremely excited, and the dream continues.”
Evil Empire seems very much to have found itself in the position to snap up such projects. The pair both appear to be happy in that spot, and are eager to encourage other teams to do the same. The added benefit is that it allows the studio to continue to grow and evolve with safer projects until the time is right for something original. “One thing we are after is to create the best team we can,” Pfeiffer remarks. “That’s why we are very happy to preserve the knowledge we have for many years now, and to improve again and again.”
Pfeiffer hopes that at some point the team will be ready to create its own original game together, but stresses, “We have fun doing games as we do right now. It’s not a big deal. It’s just that at some point, as a studio, you need to create your own way to create money, to create value, and maybe to go and take more risks. For that, having your own IP is a dream. But we have time to reach it – it’s not the main thing. Making good games is the focus.” Laulan nods, adding, “It’s hard enough as it is.”
Evil Empire is now big enough to tackle multiple projects at once. In addition to running the Triple-i Initiative to help showcase fellow indie games, Pfeiffer says you can “imagine us working on two or three games in parallel at different stages.” Seeing his and Laulan’s enthusiastic reaction to that ‘dream project’ has certainly made me curious to find out more about what it could be, although judging from their response I suspect we’ll be kept in suspense for at least a while longer yet.
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