Baldur’s Gate 3 CEO Swen Vincke says he’s “fighting with embassies and consulates” to relocate developers from Larian’s Russian studio following the invasion of Ukraine.
When Russia invaded the country in February 2022, development on Baldur’s Gate 3 was already well underway, including at the company’s St. Petersburg studio. However, after the war broke out, that studio was quickly shut down. In an interview with Edge, Vincke said he was already prepared for this eventuality. “I had already thought about what we were going to do if this actually happened,” he begins.
“The decision was immediate: we can’t stay here.” Closing the studio wasn’t enough, however, as Larian quickly arranged for its staff to leave Russia. “We had to move people, because, as is often the case, you can almost predict that there will be a mobilization, which means that my entire team would go to war.”
More than 90% of the team working in the St. Petersburg studio was relocated to avoid possible conscription, meaning Larian “started fighting with embassies and consulates” to get them out.
Vincke emphasizes that his decision to close the studio and relocate the staff wasn’t just an attempt to prevent his employees from being forced into the military: he needed them to finish the game. “In a machine as complicated as an RPG, where everything is connected to everything else, if you suddenly start removing elements, everything falls apart,” he explains. “Because the things that were supposed to be done aren’t getting done.”
The impact of the studio closure was “very, very harsh,” Vincke says. “You could see the impact of that closure throughout development.” That meant nearly 18 months of repercussions, which led to compromises and cuts in the final product. It “always happens,” Vincke acknowledges, but he points out that “it’s rare to lose a studio in the middle of development.”
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