Results 2020: Anna Grigorieva from Super.com about the main thing for the year

We continue to summarize the results of 2020 together with top managers and experts of the gaming industry (and related ones). Next up is an interview with Anna Grigorieva, the publishing director of the publishing house Super.com . She talked about the success of Raji: An Ancient Epic and the growing number of cooperative games.

Anna Grigorieva

How was 2020 for the company?

The year 2020 is for Super.com — it is a long and fruitful journey from the first release of our company to the debut at The Game Awards. A great year!

At the beginning of 2020, we were just preparing for the first launch of our game Broken Lines on Steam and GOG platforms. After that, the following went on stream: exclusive party games on the Nintendo Switch, launches on PlayStation, Xbox, GOG and even EGS. Zelter and Alchemist Adventure appeared in early access. Moreover, the first one immediately got into the sales leaders and a lot of recommendation collections, which is very pleasant.

Zelter

The highlight was the release of Raji: An Ancient Epic. At first, the game was included in the list of temporary exclusives on the Nintendo Switch, having been released during the live broadcast of Indie World. Then there was a launch on all platforms, and recently we got the project at The Game Awards 2020 in the nomination "Best debut game".

Despite the pandemic, our company has gained many partners in Asia this year. We started launching games not only on familiar platforms, but also in local regional stores. For example, recently one of our games was released on Smilegate STOVE with an exclusive Korean localization, and other projects are preparing to launch with local publishers in Japan, Korea and China, receiving all the necessary ratings and approvals. In general, the year was held under the auspices of "learn and try new things every day, develop every day."

Raji: An Ancient Epic

What new trends in your niche do you consider worth paying attention to?

The segment of cooperative games is growing. This is not news. More interesting is how exactly this segment is gaining new markets and audiences, through which genres new to the segment it is becoming more widespread. Great examples of this are Fall Guys, Among Us and Phasmophobia. In these games, the cooperative offers not familiar and hackneyed mechanics (a la loot shooter or battle royale), but a new gaming experience.

What new market trends would you note in general?

I have been working in the industry since 2007. Of these, developers from Asia have been in my focus for almost 10 years. In recent years, all large and small studios have moved to mobile, and the quality of their games for "big" platforms has become worse.

But, according to my observations over the past year, I can say with confidence that Asia is now returning with renewed vigor. First of all, the changes are noticeable in China. Excellent product quality, interesting ideas and approaches to development, expanding the boundaries of settings beyond the usual Asian region. Genshin Impact, Black Myth: Wukong, Bright Memory are just the tip of the iceberg. Today, you can find a lot of interesting and high-quality games from China on Steam. And this is just the beginning. We are waiting for Chinese projects to compete with the largest studios in North America and Europe.

What will be the stake in the development of the company in 2021?

We are planning more major releases. Already, there are several AA-class projects in our pipeline, which we will announce next year. Our main directions do not change: We are still looking for interesting games for PC and consoles with unique, non-standard combinations of mechanics and settings. We give priority to action games and simulators. We are ready to consider developer projects at any stage!

Which third-party game releases are you interested in this year? What kind of attention did you pay specifically as a gamer?

Thanks to the quarantine and additional free time, I was able to personally get acquainted with a large number of projects. For example, Outer Wilds is a unique game with which there is little that can be compared. That is a rare example when it is almost impossible to re-try it (well, except only after amnesia). Having studied the game completely and learned all the secrets of a small star system, you already know too much. And this perfectly complements the existential theme of the rest of the project's systems. I think it's worth talking about it in the results of each year for another decade ahead.

Finally, Factorio and Deep Rock Galactic reached the coveted release. Hades brought several years of rogue likes development to almost perfection, although it slightly overshadowed the release of the sequel to his great-grandfather, Spelunky 2. Half–Life: Alyx showed that VR games have a bright future, showing that the installation base for high-quality products is already sufficient. It's hard not to mention several excellent releases in the FPS genre: Doom Eternal and ULTRAKILL were a breath of fresh air (blood?), and Ghostrunner finally allowed you to play for Genji, who does not need treatment.