"A year of pre-production, but also of significant team growth," — Artur Mostovoy from Larian Studios on the outcomes of 2024

We continue to review the outcomes of 2024 with gaming (or gaming-related) teams and experts. This time, we spoke with Artur Mostov, the director of the London branch of Larian Studios.

How was the year for the company? What achievements would you like to highlight?

A year of pre-production, but simultaneously one of active growth in teams and technologies to execute our ideas.

Speaking of achievements, we were very pleased to win the TGA award (Best Community Support) and the Evolving Game nomination at the BAFTA. We really continued to support Baldur’s Gate 3 actively post-release while working on new projects.

From your perspective, how has the situation in the gaming market changed?

The overall vibe — many small breakthroughs and large failures, lots of layoffs, but also optimism when looking to the future. Indie games are generating more units and revenue, but overall the market barely grew over the year — which is understandable, considering the past couple of years of correction.

How was the year for the genre in which you work?

Speaking about RPGs in general — I would say the year turned out quite well. Some projects delighted and won awards, while others perhaps didn’t meet their publishers' expectations; nonetheless, they were interesting to explore and sometimes to dive into for tens of hours. For me, Elden Ring: SOTE (love and hate), Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden, Dragon’s Dogma 2, Dragon Age: The Veilguard, and Last Epoch stood out.

There were several extremely interesting projects at the intersection of RPG and other genres, which went into early access in 2024 and made it to my personal top chart — Witchfire, No Rest for the Wicked, Path of Exile 2.

I cannot name many notable CRPGs released in 2024, except perhaps the turn-based The Thaumaturge. But I do not think it is necessary to limit the answer to this specific niche. There are many wonderful genre fusions in role-playing games, not all of which are turn-based. Speaking of turn-based games, I saw quite a few notable and lively JRPGs this year, but I didn’t play them myself — not quite my genre.

What strengthening or emergence of trends in your niche do you expect in 2025?

I hope that this year the wave of layoffs and studio closures finally reaches the last station, and then it goes out of circulation — it seems like it’s time for the market correction to end and for the industry to pick up steam again.

At the same time, it seems that this correction and conservative investments in the industry, plus major failures over the past few years, have started forming a trend towards deconsolidation — more small, independent, and daring teams are appearing in the market and trying to create something new, unique, and not bound by the chains of corporate boards and big businesses. Simultaneously, both the cost of game production and quality expectations are rising — I think this is the main reason for the fear of innovation among big publishers, but at the same time a chance for smaller teams to showcase themselves and find their gold.

I would bet on this and expect more new Dave the Divers rather than big fish.

What are the company’s plans for the next year?

Globally, all our attention and efforts are focused on new projects, which I cannot talk about in detail yet, but you have probably seen teasers from our team and information about what we will not be doing (meaning Baldur’s Gate 4). More on what we will be doing in future releases.

Regarding our UK studio, we are actively expanding the team and our presence in the region. Over the past year, we have grown by approximately 25 people (in total 75). I expect that by the end of 2025, the London team will grow to 100 employees.