Frontier COO talks Elite, dev team size, and more
Elite: Dangerous is often compared to Star Citizen, at least here in the Massively comment section. While it's certainly a fair comparison since they're both crowdfunded space sims made by veteran developers, Elite seems to get more slack, possibly due to its accelerated development schedule and the perception of Frontier as a smallish indie firm.
In reality, the company employs some 240 developers and is in the middle of a recruiting drive that will add nearly 50 more. COO David Walsh talks about that and more in a new interview at GamesIndustry.biz that touches on Frontier's success in the midst of a rocky period for the British games industry.
Frontier devs aren't just working on Elite, either, as the studio is also responsible for titles like Kinectimals, Zoo Tycoon, and Roller Coaster Tycoon 3. "Everyone in the company is plug-and-play between the different projects. They're all using the same tech," Walsh explains. "The engine we use for Elite: Dangerous is the same as the engine we use for LostWinds on smartphones. There are different technology modules that you plug in there, obviously, but it's the same fundamentals."
