What are the chances that Squad will be taking over the development of KSP2?

[RedderThanMisty]

I know it would be a much smaller team than IG, but is anybody even left at that studio? I know that after 1.12, most of the devs at Squad went to help out with KSP2's development, but did they move to intercept on a permanent basis, or do they still retain their positions at the old, Mexico city studio?

Edited May 10 by RedderThanMisty

[Scarecrow71]

The odds are next to...zero.  They sold the rights to KSP to Take Two, and I don't think they even exist any longer.

[chefsbrian]

1 hour ago, RedderThanMisty said:

I know it would be a much smaller team than IG, but is anybody even left at that studio? I know that after 1.12, most of the devs at Squad went to help out with KSP2's development, but did they move to intercept on a permanent basis, or do they still retain their positions at the old, Mexico city studio?

No - Squad still exists as far as I know. They were a marketing company first, and back to a marketing company when they cashed out from gamedev with the IP sale, and their devs went off and over with it. If they did reconstitute their game development portfolio (Terrible idea considering how the industry is treating studios right now) it'd just be all new hands under an existing name, nothing of the old guts preserved.

I have to caveat with "as far as I know" because their website did update as recently as 2022, so at least someone there has involvement enough to keep their site up to date and reason to want it. But goddamn, is it a crusty site. Definitely didn't retain any native development staff, a website this old school would physically hurt any coders  

[K^2]

The closest thing we have to old school Squad to work on KSP2 is Floating Origin Interactive, which is HarvesteR's new studio.

Personally, I don't hate the idea of having FOI work on KSP2, because their domain seems to be exactly what KSP2 is missing the most right now. I have a feeling they'd be able to turn it into a working game, building on framework and assets created by IG. That said, based on HarvesteR's older interviews it sounds like he'd have no interest in this, and they do have their hands full with Kit Hack. Of course, who knows? I don't know what their financial situation is and how the feelings might have changed. If PD is shopping for a dev and don't at least send an email to FOI to test the waters, I think it'd be a mistake.

Not that I'm holding my breath.

[Bej Kerman]

What would Squad do with KSP 2? Populate the VAB with animated Kerbals, change a few textures, add fireworks, then announce that development is wrapping up?

I'd much rather see Rocketwerkz take over development of KSP 2, they were competing against Star Theory to do KSP 2 so they've obviously shown interest in the project, plus they'd probably have fresh ideas for the game and the skillset to approach it as opposed to Squad's "add inane pointless features and let technical debt rack up" routine that left a sequel to KSP necessary for the IP in the first place.

This is still assuming T2 doesn't want to cancel KSP 2 though, which we probably won't know until the earnings call.

[chefsbrian]

7 hours ago, Bej Kerman said:

I'd much rather see Rocketwerkz take over development of KSP 2, they were competing against Star Theory to do KSP 2 so they've obviously shown interest in the project

Yes, but from Deans comments around this, they decided to do it anyway when they didn't get the IP - So Rocketwerkz won't take over KSP2 because they got their own KSP competitor style game in progress. If anything, they have a huge incentive to not pick up KSP2, fan sentiment about the franchise is probably at an all time low right now, so interest in a potential competitor is going to be through the roof, at the same time that their only other major competitor quite literally crashed and burned.

[kerbiloid]

Same chances as building another SpaceX launchpad in Mexico.

[jwenting]

On 5/10/2024 at 4:28 AM, Scarecrow71 said:

The odds are next to...zero.  They sold the rights to KSP to Take Two, and I don't think they even exist any longer.

Squad exists, but Squad never was a software company. They're a marketing company with a small internal group of guys and gals who wrote a funky space game more or less as a hobby, a space game that blew up way beyond their wildest expectations.

[Skorj]

In Felipe's interview today we heard that all the OG KSP1 devs left before the sale to Take2, so Squad wouldn't help much.