FromSoftware president Hidetaka Miyazaki says he’d “have my concerns” about pushing the studio to make a game larger than Elden Ring, which already forced him and the team to draw on “every resource and talent that we have access to.”
Speaking with The Guardian, Miyazaki assesses the size of FromSoftware against the size of Elden Ring, the studio’s biggest game by orders of magnitude. Its new Shadow of the Erdtree DLC alone is bigger than most of the studio’s previous games. Making something bigger still, even following Elden Ring’s explosive success – which obviously provided a financial cushion but hasn’t necessarily translated to expansion within the studio – is daunting.
“Where FromSoftware is right now, in terms of scale, I would say Elden Ring is really the limit,” Miyazaki says. “We’ve tapped every resource and talent that we have access to … scaling it even bigger, I’d have my concerns. Perhaps having multiple projects is the next stage, where some of the other younger talent can have the opportunity to manage and direct game design for a smaller project.”
The load-bearing phrase here is likely this: “Where FromSoftware is right now.” The developer is surely still adjusting to Elden Ring’s outlier success, as well as the attention and opportunities it’s brought, with Miyazaki and other executives likely weighing up options for growth against the risks of overreaching or altering the studio’s culture. FromSoftware won’t double in size overnight, but it’s reasonable to expect the studio to one day grow beyond its longstanding production setup.
Elsewhere, Miyazaki more broadly argues that Elden Ring was a “turning point” for the studio, and that FromSoftware games made “before and after it” will show “a clear difference,” pointing to 2023’s Armored Core 6 as one example of the studio’s evolution in action. Armored Core 6 is also a good demonstration of how Miyazaki and FromSoftware’s “conservative forecast” can support smaller games that can find smaller but still significant success.
In a separate interview, Miyazaki recently described Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice as a turning point of its own, but in the context of FromSoftware’s approach to action combat. “There’s one more level we can crank it up to,” he said, suggesting FromSoftware games could get faster and more fluid still.