THQ CEO Brian Farrell has said that Red Faction: Armageddon is to be the last game in the franchise as it “did not resonate with a sufficiently broad console gaming audience.”
In a recent investor call Farrel said,
“Given that that title now in two successive versions has [only] found a niche, we do not intend to carry forward with that franchise in any meaningful way.
In today’s hit-driven, core gaming business, even highly-polished titles with a reasonable following like Red Faction face a bar that continues to move higher and higher.”
Red Faction: Armageddon has a Metacritic rating of around 73 but THQ will be reviewing its output to ensure higher quality games.
Source: Gamasutra
Jacko
Guerrilla was the best Red Faction. I enjoyed that far more than the FPS Red Factions.
If they’d have stuck with open-world and a competitive multiplayer, this wouldn’t have happened.
KeRaSh
It’s sad that Homefront didn’t do well but they immediately started production of a sequel but they have no problem ditching a great franchise. I hope Volition finds a new publishing partner to continue the Red Faction brand. I loved the FPS RFs, I loved Guerilla (so much undeserved hate towards a great game that worked liek a charm due to it’s third person nature), Armageddon was a step back but no reason to kill off the whole thing.
Another step towards a world where every publisher only has 2 or 3 franchises in it’s line up that get pushed while the real diversity in games slowly but surely dies.
Time to pre order that next big war-centric FPS, I guess.
Rad4Life
Hard to establish a franchise when Armageddon was fantastic yet sorta ignored. Then, you completely screw that successful formula up and those interested in the series pass because the features they loved are gone. THQ deserves to be slapped for such assumptions. Release Armageddon 2 and I guarantee sales will be much better.
KeRaSh
Armageddon = Guerilla
There, I fixed that for you. :)
R4U Eldave0
Red Faction 1 and 2 HD collection in 2012. I call it.
bunimomike
Sad news, in a way, but not surprising. Armageddon sounds like they’ve lost their way a bit and perhaps their time is better spent on new IP. Good on them for knowing when to move on.
xdarkmagician
Way to kill the franchise THQ. THQ only has themselves to blame for this. You can’t change a game just to try to capitalize on what somebody thinks is popular and expect consumers to buy in. Let this be a lesson to any other publisher that if you ignore your fanbase, the fanbase will ignore you. I loved RF1, and have felt less passionate about each game since. I’m glad that THQ will stop making RF games because the series deserves better. Here’s hoping they’ll sell the rights to a dev/pub that can bring the series back to its roots and former glory.