Haze, by all accounts, was not a successful game. The PS3 exclusive didn’t sell well, and it was critically mauled with reviewers citing poorly executed combat, weak technical achievements, bad writing and ambitions that were never realized as incredible low points. The developers, however, believe that the PS3 itself played a significant part in Haze‘s failure.
“[Haze] had a lot of development issues which meant it wasn’t the game it should have been,” explains Free Radical’s Karl Hilton. “A lot of them were technical issues. The PS3 is a powerful machine but a difficult one to get the best out of. We spent more time trying get the game running properly and less time to design the game properly.”
Free Radical is now Crytek UK, with the original firm going into administration following the release of Haze. However, now armed with the CryEngine, Hilton believes that the PS3 will be a happier platform for his team in future: “I don’t think we’ve seen the best out of the PS3 at all, and I definitely think one of the best things about Crytek and the CryEngine is that we’re now in the best position to get the most out of the hardware.”
What do you think? Would Haze have fared better on another system, or was there far more than the PS3 going against Free Radical?
