Psychonauts Almost Killed Double Fine
Many times, there are games that we remember very fondly, regardless of the struggle and pain that might have gone on behind the scenes to create it. A great example of this is Metroid Prime, which almost destroyed Retro Studios when it was being made, but eventually helped them become one of Nintendo’s biggest in-house developers. For Double Fine, a studio which is legendary as well, they had a similar problem with the much beloved Psychonauts. As Tim Schaffer revealed to IGN that the process of making that game almost bankrupted them.
“I borrowed money, I borrowed a lot of money to keep the studio going. I was personally on the line. I would have been in debt for the rest of my life for the money I borrowed to make payroll.”
And he almost closed the studio down…
“I thought it wasn’t going to happen so I made a speech to the team saying that next week’s payroll was the last payroll, and all the air just went out of the room. Then I went back to my desk and found an email from Majesco and I was like ‘hold on team, don’t walk out the door!’”
Majesco helped finish Psychonauts, and thus Double Fine lived, and went on to be the developer we now know them as.