Based in 2004, Virtuos has grown into an enormous firm in the case of the manufacturing of video games. As an exterior developer, Virtuos‘ crew has crossed 4,200 skilled recreation devs who can complement the groups at recreation studios and publishers as they end their video games.
The Singapore-based firm can end smaller video games with an enormous shot of staffing on the finish or interact in long-term co-development with recreation publishers as they begin the video games. Virtuos has an enormous presence in Asia, and it has labored with almost the entire prime 25 leisure firms on this planet, with both work on video or recreation content material.
I’ve caught up with Virtuos CEO Gilles Langourieux a number of occasions lately — together with final February 2024 and in October 2024 — to get entry to his chook’s-eye view on the worldwide image of creating video games.
I noticed him briefly on the Cube Summit in Las Vegas and caught up with him in an internet dialog this week. As soon as once more, we talked about all the pieces from the state of the sport jobs market to using AI in making video games.
His firm began in China in 2004 with a studio in Shanghai. It expanded to different cities like Chengdu and Xian. Then it acquired Sparx in 2011 and moved out of China to relocate its headquarters to Singapore in 2018. Langourieux’s firm has labored on effectively over 1,000 initiatives for the highest digital leisure firms internationally.
Not too long ago, the corporate labored on DLC for Cyberpunk 2077, Metallic Gear Strong Delta: Snake Eater, and extra. He’s excited to see video games coming like Marvel 1943, Judas, Gears of Conflict, Mafia, Doom and extra. In our dialog, we touched on how tight budgets might result in extra creativity, the contraction of gaming, the should be world, the shift to the large recreation engines like Unreal vs proprietary engines, the necessity to rejuvenate older IPs,
Right here’s an edited transcript of our interview.
GamesBeat: How was DICE Summit? I noticed you there briefly.
Gilles Langourieux: I loved it, however I spent an excessive amount of time in conferences. It’s unusual. Normally I spend extra time at DICE on the ground and listening. For some purpose I had too many conferences this time. Possibly as a result of there’s a lot reorganization happening.
GamesBeat: It’s the identical for me. I needed to schedule numerous again to again conferences. I ran out of time to simply go discover individuals and say hiya.
Langourieux: However due to you–for instance, I learn by the transcript of the dialog between Neil Druckmann and his counterpart Cory Barlog at Santa Monica, about creativity. That’s one I might have appreciated to attend in particular person.
GamesBeat: It was attention-grabbing, the mature approach they’d of trying on the conflict between enterprise and creativity. You possibly can create endlessly and iterate again and again, however lastly, when somebody provides you a schedule, that’s when it’s a must to ship.
Langourieux: Should you apply that to what’s happening on the extra world enterprise degree, the identical might be true. With extra funds constraints, we would find yourself with renewed creativity. Identical to the deadlines are forcing Neil’s crew to give you the very best that they’ve, tighter budgets may additionally arrive at an identical outcome.
We’ve made this massive transfer to put money into three growth studios within the west. We felt this was mandatory on two fronts. First, to exhibit clearly to the business that we’re recreation builders. We have now full recreation growth capabilities. Second, to make it simpler for our groups to have interaction with shoppers throughout pre-production. If you wish to do co-dev proper, it’s essential begin early. To start out early, it’s essential construct belief throughout pre-production. It’s simpler to construct belief throughout pre-production if in case you have groups in the identical tradition and the identical time zone.
What Pipeworks on the west coast, Umanaïa in Montreal, and Abstraction in central Europe carry to us is that proximity in time zones and tradition. They’ve been doing co-development for a few years. They’re good at embedding themselves with shoppers early. We carry the flexibility to scale. They’ve perhaps had extra limitations there.
Greater than ever, we imagine in our mannequin of bringing flexibility to recreation growth studios. We predict studios face, with funds constraints–they should depend on leaner, extra agile inside groups. Our a part of the business is to carry that flexibility to them by making it straightforward. Prior to now, in our historical past, we began in China. Our groups had been far-off, offshore groups, totally different cultures, totally different time zones. We’ve been profitable with that mannequin, nevertheless it was time for us to get nearer to our shoppers, so we are able to begin work earlier and deeper. Then we are able to get everybody working collectively when there’s a must scale up.
GamesBeat: There’s an attention-grabbing distinction occurring. I wouldn’t ask you to touch upon them particularly, however Netease appears to be going the wrong way. They’ve seemed on the high quality of the triple-A content material like Black Delusion: Wukong and determined that the groups in China are able to do a number of triple-A video games. They need to double down on these. The consequence for them is that they only completed investing some huge cash into western studios that they now take a look at as too costly. They could not want these individuals anymore. They may retreat from all of that.
Langourieux: They’re a writer. We’re a growth studio specializing in co-development. How we should be arrange is sort of totally different. It’s essential for us to have world groups working with shoppers in each area. We have now enterprise relationships in North America, Europe, and Asia. The simpler it’s for them to work with us, the higher our enterprise. By definition, we have now to be world. This has nothing to do with the technique of this writer or that writer. We have now to be world.
The purpose we are able to agree on is that sure, there may be nice growth expertise in each area, together with China. Black Delusion: Wukong has demonstrated that in a stellar approach. We’re making an attempt to have studios in each expertise pool that issues and take the very best of that expertise pool and make them work collectively. What’s distinctive in regards to the Virtuos setup is that each one our studios are good at working collectively. Relying on the wants of this recreation or that shopper, we are able to discover the correct expertise in the correct place and make them work collectively to create an answer. We name that the “glocalized” strategy. It’s world and native on the identical time. I don’t assume many publishers have that very same strategy, or want that very same strategy.
GamesBeat: What number of studios do you continue to must put money into? Is that clear to you but?
Langourieux: Our technique just isn’t a roll-up technique. We’re not making an attempt to amass many studios. What’s essential for us is to have one studio in each geography the place nice video games are made. We’re nonetheless lacking a few geographies. We’re making an attempt to finish the puzzle in order that we cowl all of the essential geographies the place video games are made. We cowl all of the essential expertise swimming pools and we cowl all of the essential platforms. However as soon as we have now a studio like Pipeworks, we don’t plan so as to add two or three rivals to Pipeworks in the identical space. We simply plan to assist them develop as a lot as they’re in a position and prepared to develop.
Black Shamrock was a studio we acquired in Eire in 2017. There have been 15 individuals on the time. Immediately it’s 200 individuals and one of many greatest in Eire. We have now a observe of rising the studios we purchase, not stockpiling increasingly more studios that find yourself competing with one another.
GamesBeat: How many individuals do you’ve gotten altogether now? Nonetheless within the 4,000 vary or so?
Langourieux: We broke 4,000 with these three acquisitions. We’re now at 4,200 throughout 25 totally different places of work. I need to insist once more, these are all studios engaged on the identical platform, to allow them to all work collectively and type options collectively to serve the manufacturing wants of our shoppers.
GamesBeat: How does a number of the outlook break down for you in 2025 and past?
Langourieux: There’s good and unhealthy. On the plus facet, we’re very pleased to start out the yr with the discharge of DLC 2.2 for Cyberpunk, which illustrates how we may help a shopper broaden their IP whereas persevering with to develop different video games. They will fulfill an current viewers whereas persevering with to develop different video games by counting on a few of our inventive groups. We had been very excited to see Metallic Gear Strong get a launch date. That’s going to be an ideal showcase of our high-end Unreal 5 co-development capabilities. We’re excited to see the Swap 2 get introduced. We had an ideal run on the primary Swap with greater than 10 titles developed for the platform. We predict the subsequent one goes to be very attention-grabbing.
That’s all of the constructive. On the identical time, the atmosphere remains to be a bumpy one. We see cancellations. We see the overinvestment bubble of 2021 and 2022 persevering with to deflate. We have now to maintain all our groups on their toes and use our world group to mitigate these sorts of points. We proceed to see cancellations.
GamesBeat: There are nonetheless some unhealthy firms among the many massive ones, or firms that aren’t fairly completed with their unraveling course of.
Langourieux: On that word, I like to match it to 2008, once we noticed the disappearance of Halfway and THQ nearly in the identical yr. That left some unpaid invoices for fairly a couple of builders. I’m not seeing that proper now. I’m not saying that received’t occur, nevertheless it doesn’t appear like any of the foremost publishers, at the very least, are going out of enterprise. There’s some reorganization occurring for certain.
GamesBeat: How are you unfold throughout not simply geographies, however capabilities as effectively? Issues like Unreal versus Unity retailers and different kinds of specialization throughout the group.
Langourieux: 5 years in the past, greater than 60% of the work that we had been doing was carried out in proprietary engines. Immediately I believe it’s the opposite approach round. Greater than 60% of the work we do is finished in middleware engines like Unreal and Unity. We do extra work on larger video games, and greater video games are typically made extra with Unreal. While you hear Epic declare greater than 50% market share, it’s per what we’re seeing on our finish.
There’s a constructive component to that. Ability units switch extra simply than earlier than from one venture to a different. For instance, when we have now a big cancellation occurring, it’s simpler for us to reorganize and have groups work on different initiatives. Their Unreal abilities are helpful on different Unreal initiatives. Prior to now, once we had an enormous cancellation on a proprietary engine, if the identical shopper on the identical engine didn’t have extra work for us, there was a delay by way of retraining the crew to do co-development work in a special pipeline.
GamesBeat: I requested Tim Sweeney about this as soon as. One consequence of getting a number of shifts towards Unreal is likely to be that a number of video games begin trying the identical. He stated which may have been true across the Unreal 2 or 3 stage, however now there’s far more customization doable throughout the engine.
Langourieux: I fully agree. In reality, we began one thing we name the Virtuos Labs, that are small studios purely targeted on engineering. One of many bigger labs we have now now could be Abstraction Video games. They’ve 100 individuals, an engineering studio. A few of the work they do is precisely that. They customise pipelines based mostly on Unreal to make sure sorts of video games which have their very own particular taste, their very own particular gameplay due to that customization effort. We do see that taking place.
GamesBeat: Do you see a transparent calculation on–if an organization adjustments to a extra normal recreation engine as a substitute of a proprietary one, does that save a certain quantity of manufacturing prices?
Langourieux: What I’ve seen and heard probably the most is across the ease of discovering and coaching expertise. If in case you have a typical pipeline, it turns into simpler to recruit and quicker to onboard expertise in comparison with proprietary engines, which create a barrier to inception of expertise, and in addition, in a approach, a barrier to inception of co-development companions. One dimension doesn’t match all. We’ll proceed to wish proprietary engines and work with them, as a result of in lots of cases they permit the creators to get extra out of the {hardware}, to optimize for sure sorts of gameplay and sure sorts of rendering. However having one normal makes it simpler on the HR degree.
GamesBeat: Are the macroeconomic components trying any totally different right this moment than six months in the past? We nonetheless have inflation in america. We’re not seeing an enormous development wave. We nonetheless appear to have a slow-growing economic system.
Langourieux: If I look continent by continent, China and southeast Asia appear to be probably the most dynamic proper now, adopted by Korea. Japan is a combined bag. You’ve two sorts of actors there. Some are nonetheless restructuring. Others are very bullish about making merchandise for the worldwide market to compensate for the slower native market. Europe and North America are each nonetheless working by a brand new strategy to recreation growth with safer bets on merchandise made by smaller groups.
I learn the articles worrying about employment within the west. As soon as the mannequin has been rebalanced, there’s no purpose for employment to not take off once more. It might be otherwise, with extra reliance on freelancing and exterior growth than earlier than. Leaner inside studios as effectively. However there’s no purpose for development to not choose up once more. There’s an urge for food, for instance, that we see throughout the board for rejuvenating IPs. IPs that had been left on the sideline as a result of we had been solely funding big bets on massive video games as a service. Now there’s a renewed urge for food for trying again on older IPs that would make for smaller, extra inventive titles.
GamesBeat: I’m beginning to see extra formation of recent publishers. That’s totally different from the development I noticed round lots of them closing within the final couple of years. Our job market counter, Amir Satvat, thinks we had an attention-grabbing crossover month in January, the place there was lastly extra hiring than firing within the month. On a six-week trailing foundation, that is the primary time he thinks that’s occurred in 30 months or so. Do you see any matching information in your facet suggesting that the layoff wave is likely to be balancing out with extra hiring?
Langourieux: I don’t have information that’s nearly as good as his, however what I see on our finish is that we’re in a position to proceed rising our headcount. We’re tapping into totally different world markets, that are working at barely totally different rhythms. When one market is dealing with a cancellation, we glance to a different market to compensate.
GamesBeat: What else do you discover in regards to the construction of the exterior growth business? I’m interested in what it’s prefer to function in a market the place there’s one firm that’s a lot larger than you, at the very least by way of what number of workers they’ve.
Langourieux: It’s thrilling. We have now groups which have the chance to work on improbable manufacturers. Simply take into consideration a couple of upcoming titles. Marvel 1943, Judas, Gears of Conflict, Mafia, DOOM. There’s a lot happening. While you’re working in an organization at our scale, you’ll be able to give attention to the positives and ensure you affiliate your groups with the most definitely winners of tomorrow.
There are nonetheless a number of winners. You go to DICE and also you meet individuals. Not everyone seems to be sad about cancellations and layoffs. You’ve a smaller variety of firms which are delivering profitable titles. They’re pleased and constructive in regards to the future. We attempt to give attention to serving to these firms. Our individuals get to work on these sorts of promising video games. We additionally attempt to dodge the bullets. I believe that’s a good approach of describing what it’s prefer to function at our dimension.
GamesBeat: What’s your course of for locating these companions and initiatives like? You get out to a number of occasions.
Langourieux: I do. It’s an attention-grabbing a part of my job. We have now, I suppose, two parallel methods. Our studios have current relationships with different studios that they preserve. A few of the relationships we have now are as previous as the corporate. A few of the preliminary shoppers we began working with once we fashioned the corporate are nonetheless shoppers right this moment. Our studio management maintains these relationships round IPs or manufacturers that we’re acquainted with. One instance is the Last Fantasy model. We’ve been engaged on that nonstop for greater than 15 years.
Then we have now a worldwide crew round enterprise growth. They communicate to studios throughout occasions to exhibit the fantastic thing about co-development carried out effectively. There’s a real magnificence and luxury when you’ve gotten co-development partnerships established early on in your manufacturing cycles, which are supplying you with extra choices and extra flexibility as you progress by the event of a recreation. Our groups are there to exhibit how we assist shoppers design, develop, and ship. That third D, delivering, is commonly the vital piece. With the ability to ship one thing at high quality and on time. That’s the Virtuos approach.
We have now evangelists round what good co-dev seems to be like. They’re in a position to clarify how essential it’s to start out early, how essential it’s to have the flexibility to scale steadily, how essential it’s to place in place the identical techniques on each side that give transparency. Early, scalability, transparency. They present what attractiveness like for co-dev. That’s how we’re steadily including increasingly more shoppers to our enterprise, by these evangelists.
I don’t know for those who’ve met Lindsay Gupton, the top of Pipeworks. He’s been doing this for 26 years now. They’re so good at it. I’m fortunate to have such a grasp of co-development be part of the group and assist us present our American shoppers how it may be carried out even higher right this moment with the addition of Pipeworks.
GamesBeat: Are you working into working with a number of co-development firms on the identical time?
Langourieux: I don’t suggest to our shoppers that they put all their eggs in a single basket. It’s completely doable to have a number of co-development studios facet by facet. I do advocate that they alter from the previous mannequin of getting dozens of siloed smaller studios. It’s tough to coordinate them, to maintain them aligned on the identical imaginative and prescient. Fairly often it’s a must to do the mixing and polish your self in that older mannequin. We suggest going towards a simplified mannequin, the place you depend on a smaller variety of larger co-development companions who will deal with the coordination, who will deal with the mixing for you.
The mannequin the place you’re working with many various smaller exterior distributors doesn’t scale very effectively. It results in a number of closing points towards the tip of manufacturing.
GamesBeat: Unity had their issues round worth will increase. They introduced in a brand new CEO. It looks as if they’re in a extra steady state of affairs. Issues are a bit extra predictable. They’re not at conflict with their prospects anymore. I think about that’s a very good factor for firms like yours.
Langourieux: All I can say is that though there was a number of noise round this, we haven’t seen a whole change in who’s utilizing what engine. It’s tough to alter a pipeline. There might have been a few cases the place these adjustments had been made, however the state of who’s utilizing what hasn’t fully modified so far as we are able to see. I believe it’s good for the business if they’ve a corporation and pricing construction that makes their shoppers happier. It’s good that they managed to right course.
GamesBeat: I used to be going into an interview lately with AWS about cloud recreation growth. What do you concentrate on the state of that proper now?
Langourieux: It’s essential. Preliminary efforts are on the best way from many various events. You talked about Amazon. You possibly can see what Microsoft is doing with their very own cloud resolution. The gamers in China are additionally very lively. Alibaba, Tencent, they’ve various cloud initiatives. It was additionally attention-grabbing to listen to how Asia is the fastest-growing marketplace for Xbox, due to gamers experiencing Xbox by the cloud. The gadgets they use in lower-income nations are much less highly effective, however that’s compensated for by the truth that they entry video games by the cloud. That ought to proceed.
We’re pleased to see these new applied sciences. We’re trying ahead to seeing this new infrastructure combining with AI to result in new sorts of video games. At GDC we plan to showcase, with Inworld, new sorts of video games that may be created due to AI. I count on we’ll be solely one in every of many related initiatives. It’s required. We aren’t going to develop the business by merely rejuvenating previous IPs or making smaller video games. We additionally must carry fully new sorts of gameplay.
GamesBeat: Have you ever seen AI instruments arriving but which are dwelling as much as a number of the hype?
Langourieux: I wouldn’t level to a single device. I believe we should always level at a mixture of instruments that when assembled collectively, one after the opposite, let you rework a standard workflow into one thing that strikes twice as quick. The primary wave of AI use appears to be extra structured this manner, fairly than a killer app. I haven’t seen improbable video games made by a single immediate but. Possibly others have. However I’ve seen whole workflows accelerated. I’ve seen new sorts of gameplay turning into doable due to the countless prospects that AI now provides.
GamesBeat: We nonetheless perhaps have a number of impression forward of us.
Langourieux: I’m satisfied of that, completely.
GamesBeat: Do you count on new consoles on a sure timetable after Nintendo? Are there any explicit indications?
Langourieux: No, I’ve no indications. What I’m most enthusiastic about is to see how we’re going to faucet into the subsequent bucket of potential avid gamers, individuals who can’t purchase an costly platform, however are enjoying by both a lower-end cellular gadget or lower-end PC. We’re in a position to entry them by a mixture of cloud infrastructure and adapting content material to go well with after they prefer to play, what they prefer to play, and what they’ll afford. Should you take a look at the lower-income economies in Asia, in Africa, in South America, there are nonetheless a number of new gamers to go after.
GamesBeat: Do you see developments like metaverse and blockchain coming or going?
Langourieux: Nothing new on that entrance. It’s nonetheless a minority of labor for us, not the bulk. The transfer that’s persevering with is IPs which are sturdy in a single area making an attempt to develop their participant base in different areas, or making an attempt to broaden to go well with new demographics. That’s in all probability the place we see probably the most motion. Apart from the change in mannequin that we already focus on, from larger studios to smaller studios, larger titles to leaner titles at launch.
GamesBeat: I talked to a consulting agency that was targeted on IP technology. That they had an attention-grabbing viewpoint across the common conduct of recreation studios. They iterated endlessly on gameplay, with a recent construct day-after-day or each week, and examined that exhaustively. However one of many outcomes of that was that they usually thought in regards to the IP behind the sport in maybe the final three months. Issues like world-building and character design had been extra of an afterthought. They spend a lot time on gameplay that you simply don’t get the type of sturdy IP that comes out of one thing like The Final of Us.
Langourieux: I grew up with that type of strategy, the place you’re in search of a recreation design and know-how breakthrough earlier than you assemble the remainder of your recreation round it. I’m not sure that it’s a singular recipe. To paraphrase Neil from his DICE dialog, there is no such thing as a distinctive strategy to arrive at a profitable recreation. Sure groups have this technique. Different groups desire to construct a universe first and determine the sport design down the highway. We see each.
One thing that’s newer in PC and console gaming, although, is what you might name shopper publishing, the place you’ve gotten groups which are targeted on creating and aligning a neighborhood with a recreation on the identical time the sport is being constructed. Completely different groups have other ways of doing it, however the widespread theme there may be that you simply need to have avid gamers which are sturdy representatives of the viewers related together with your growth from early on. Then steadily, as they make it easier to nail down the content material of your recreation, you snowball them into one thing that’s going to be your neighborhood. When the sport is able to exit within the open, they rally the troops, the core avid gamers, across the recreation. This strategy to creating video games in co-creation with a neighborhood wasn’t mainstream for PC and console 5 or 10 years in the past. It’s turning into increasingly more frequent, although.
GamesBeat: Matthew Ball identified that one of many massive challenges is that so many individuals play older video games for such a very long time now. Name of Responsibility Warzone stops me from having numerous time to play model new video games.
Langourieux: However is right this moment’s Name of Responsibility Warzone the identical because it was a yr or two in the past? The work that goes into it–it retains altering. There’s a lot new content material. I don’t totally perceive that argument. Sure, it’s the identical title, however there may be a number of work going into including, adjusting, increasing the content material. It turns into a brand new expertise month after month. In return, there may be further income coming in from the gamers in numerous methods. I don’t assume that’s unhealthy in any respect. I don’t see the way it’s totally different from 20 years in the past, when individuals performed a recreation after which purchased the sequel.
GamesBeat: The purpose that Matthew and a few others have made is that the window of time for individuals to check out a model new IP that they’ve by no means heard of earlier than is smaller. Stay service video games devour a number of their time. They’ll check out a brand new recreation, however they received’t do it each month, maybe.
Langourieux: That’s completely true. You don’t have that time period the place you’ve completed a boxed product you really liked and also you’re ready for the subsequent field to ship. Discovery is harder consequently.
