I think a lot about Treasure, a quirky game developer that tended to make a bunch of strange games in the past. I think their studio director and founder, Masat

I think a lot about Treasure, a quirky game developer that tended to make a bunch of strange games in the past. I think their studio director and founder, Masato Maegawa, understood the value in being more hands-off in a leadership role. [1] [2] Part of me feels like Amazon and Google thought their super-direct top-down style would be successful in a creative project involving larger team, unaware of the lessons previous game developers had learned. Hardspace: Shipbreaker, on the other hand had a unqiue idea and was a critical success, and in a retrospective the developers were very explicit not to impose a top-down attitude to development. [3] (disclaimer: I work at Blackbird Interactive, but not on Hardspace: Shipbreaker) [1] http://iwataasks.nintendo.com/interviews/#/wii/sinandpunishment/0/1 http://iwataasks.nintendo.com/interviews/#/wii/sinandpunishm... [2] http://shmuplations.com/aliensoldier/ http://shmuplations.com/aliensoldier/ [3] https://www.gdcvault.com/play/1026825/Forging-Hardspace-Shipbreaker-Creating-Processes https://www.gdcvault.com/play/1026825/Forging-Hardspace-Ship...