IO Interactive Revealed How They Are Saving Money in Game Development

IO Interactive has talked honestly about saving money while developing latest Hitman games.

IO Interactive Using Assets More Than One Time

Released between 2016 and 2021, the newest Hitman trilogy was a critical success, although all three games follow the gameplay loop typical of the Hitman series. In January 2023, Hitman 3 was eventually rebranded as Hitman World of Assassination, and content from the previous two games was made available for free. This has allowed the trilogy to feel even more like one cohesive experience that is easy to enjoy from start to finish.

In a recent interview on The Game Business Show podcast, IO Interactive CEO Hakan Abrak spoke about how the studio saved money developing the Hitman trilogy. According to Abrak, reusing certain assets during development made things much cheaper long-term, claiming, “We were just doing new everything, and it was just a throwaway… If you just look at Hitman, the way we build, especially after Absolution, I was the EP on Absolution, and I swore never to do more new toilets.” Asset reuse is common in some other games, but it seems that IO Interactive was able to be particularly efficient in how it created the worlds for the Hitman ​​​​​​trilogy.

Abrak was able to talk numbers, too, giving a general indication of how much money was saved through this asset reuse. “Without being too precise: Hitman ’16, let’s say that if that was $100 million, Hitman 2 was maybe $60 million. Hitman 3 was $20 million.” Although those aren’t exact figures, it illustrates his point perfectly about how this efficiency has allowed IO Interactive to punch above its weight. It hasn’t harmed the critical reception of the games, either, with all three being some of the best stealth games on the market. According to review aggregator site OpenCritic, the Top Critic Average of all three games sits at 84, 83, and 85 respectively, so evidently critics were not too fussed about the reuse of toilet assets.

Abrak was able to talk numbers, too, giving a general indication of how much money was saved through this asset reuse. “Without being too precise: Hitman ’16, let’s say that if that was $100 million, Hitman 2 was maybe $60 million. Hitman 3 was $20 million.” Although those aren’t exact figures, it illustrates his point perfectly about how this efficiency has allowed IO Interactive to punch above its weight. It hasn’t harmed the critical reception of the games, either, with all three being some of the best stealth games on the market. According to review aggregator site OpenCritic, the Top Critic Average of all three games sits at 84, 83, and 85 respectively, so evidently critics were not too fussed about the reuse of toilet assets.

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