Larian Studios’ CEO says, “we did have to do a bit of crunch” making Baldur’s Gate 3

Larian Studios’ Swen Vincke has opened up about crunch culture at the studio, acknowledging that the team did, at times, “have to do a bit of crunch” when “things happened that [the studio] didn’t foresee”.

In the Q&A Vincke hosted after his address at the Digital Dragons conference in Poland, Vincke was asked if the team ever had to crunch – that is, the term given to the extreme overtime studios compel staff to do to get a game ready for its release date – and whilst Vincke said the team wasn’t “overly” required to crunch, and it was “certainly less on BG3 than we did in the past”, “It would be a lie to say that we didn’t” crunch at all.

“We didn’t overly crunch,” Vincke said (thanks, GR+). “but we did have to do a bit of crunch. And I think, to be honest, you will always have a little bit when you’re trying to finish something, especially when there’s so much complexity that needs to be brought together.”

Vincke further added that anyone who had to work late was paid for their overtime – many studios purportedly do not – and only “very, very, very rarely” would people work over the weekend or past 8pm at night.

Earlier this week, Baldur’s Gate 3 developer Larian Studios shared the “disappointing news” that its physical PS5 North America deluxe editions have been delayed once again, this time to July 2024.

Larian also recently confirmed its next game will not be Baldur’s Gate 4, DLC, or anything else to do with Dungeons and Dragons… but it did tease that it had other games in development.