Krafton CEO says it acquired Tango for its creativity, even if Hi-Fi Rush 2 won’t make money

The CEO of Krafton says the acquisition of Tango Gameworks was designed to add more creativity to its portfolio, rather than to make big money.

Microsoft announced in April that Tango was one of four Bethesda developers it would be shutting down, and the studio seemingly closed its doors in June.

However, last month South Korean publisher Krafton, which also owns PUBG Studios and The Callisto Protocol studio Striking Distance, announced that it had acquired Tango Gameworks, seemingly rescuing it.

Now, in an interview with Game Developer, Changhan Kim has explained that the decision to acquire Tango wasn’t a financial one but a creative one, and that having Tango’s developers on board would lead to a greater variety of games, even if they didn’t make a fortune.

“We wanted to maintain their legacy,, “Kim said. “Although they did not have a big success in their games, we saw many creatives worth pursuing. That’s why we wanted to work with that organisation.”

Because the move is still being finalised, Kim did not tell the publication how much the acquisiton cost, simply saying that it was “not too expensive, or too cheap either”.

However, he reiterated that money wasn’t the driving factor in the deal, and stressed that even if the studio’s future games didn’t make money, he wants them to take risks and push innovative ideas without the fear of being punished for failure.

“We can’t acquire Tango Gameworks based on their financials or their numbers, right?” he explained. “We don’t think Hi-Fi Rush 2 is going to make us money, to be frank. But it’s part of our attempt. We have to keep trying [to develop games] in the spirit of challenge-taking.

“Tango Gameworks are creative. They want to try something new, and we want to do more of that. [Making] video games is really a hit or miss industry, and that is risk taking. But having more project lineups is actually a way to mitigate risk, because one of them might work out.”

Kim added that even if Tango’s projects fail to make money, if they continue to be allowed to take risks and try new things they could eventually large on a huge success.

“Just recoup the production costs, please, is what I say,” he explained. “But that in itself is a pretty big challenge. If you try doing that, you might actually land a big hit. I don’t trust people who say ‘oh, this is going to be a hit.’ I want someone who can try something new.

“The big hit shouldn’t be your goal. If you think about it that way, Hi-Fi Rush might have brought in a little bit of a minus in terms of the financials, but it’s a team that should be encouraged to create something new and continue their journey. We want to have more teams like that under our umbrella.”

Further reading

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Hi-Fi Rush studio Tango Gameworks has been acquired by Krafton and will remain open

The acquisition includes the rights to Hi-Fi Rush

Kim also confirmed that the acquistion includes just the Hi-Fi Rush IP, and not others like The Evil Within or Ghostwire Tokyo, because it would “complicate the deal too much”.

“We wanted to help the team continue developing their games, but especially Hi-Fi Rush,” he said. “When I think about our fans, I think what they really care about is Hi-Fi Rush sequels.”