Former Playground Games employee Juan Fernandez discussed his experience working on a new fable, shedding light on the studio’s expectations and the challenges it faced when transitioning from the Forza Horizon racing franchise to an RPG-driven project. Fernandez noted that the studio was already under pressure to adapt, given its historical focus on racing rather than role-playing games. He described a shift in mindset, where the team would need to rethink core design choices to accommodate a very different player experience, audience expectations, and development cadence.
Fernandez spent three years at the studio contributing to the game’s combat system, a territory that required skills and perspectives the team initially lacked. He explained that the technical demands extended beyond traditional programming and art pipelines. The project demanded sophisticated animation pipelines, scripting frameworks, and an efficient search system to support a combat-heavy design. He emphasized that achieving high-speed, cinematic combat carried unique iterative requirements; something as fast as racing at 300 km/h calls for a different approach than exploring a pastoral landscape. In his view, the technology and tooling had to be adapted to enable dynamic, responsive gameplay rather than simply porting racing mechanics into an RPG format.
Despite the hurdles, the team at Playground Games remained ambitiously lean. Fernandez provided a vivid contrast: if Ubisoft could mobilize 5 thousand people and seven years to deliver a definitive Assassin’s Creed experience, Playground Games aimed to accomplish a comparable scope with far fewer hands and in a tighter timeframe—roughly 150 to 200 developers over five years. This framing underscored the studio’s philosophy of doing more with less, prioritizing critical features, modular systems, and rapid prototyping to prove the game concept while controlling risk. The conversation highlighted how resource planning, discipline in scope management, and a strong shared vision could compensate for a smaller team in a high-stakes production cycle.
In spite of early doubts, the trajectory shifted as the studio attracted a broader pool of talent. In recent years Playground Games actively recruited specialists with expertise in role-playing mechanics, narrative design, and character progression. The new hires helped broaden the studio’s capability to deliver a more expansive RPG experience while preserving the studio’s core strengths in world-building and technical execution. This influx of talent contributed to a renewed belief that the studio could steer a large, ambitious project toward success, balancing creative ambition with practical development constraints. The overall sentiment is one of cautious optimism as the team resumes momentum and aligns on a long-term roadmap for the project.
These developments reflect a broader industry pattern where established studios pivot from proven genres toward bold, uncertain ventures. The case at Playground Games illustrates how a studio can evolve by embracing new skill sets, recalibrating production processes, and cultivating a culture that values experimentation alongside disciplined delivery. While challenges persist, the emphasis on collaboration, adaptive engineering, and a clear product vision positions the studio to attract and retain talent while building a game that resonates with players who crave deeper, more immersive RPG experiences.