10 Reasons 2025 Is Make Or Break For Triple-A Games
7. Indie & AA Games Continue To Threaten AAA
The biggest competition to a AAA game isn't really other AAA games - it's the AA and indie titles which, while developed on just a fraction of the budget, might resonate far more deeply with players.
Last year, Helldivers 2 came out of nowhere and took the gaming world by storm, becoming a sales juggernaut while being a AA title produced for a relatively modest budget.
Similarly, who among us expected indie masterpiece Balatro to come out of nowhere and eat the lunch of so many less-successful AAA games?
Yet these successes could be a result of 2024 being a relatively uninspired year for AAA, and so the true test of AAA's health will come throughout 2025.
With so many long-awaited blockbusters due for release, will AA sleeper hits still manage to beat them at their own game?
Given that studies indicate younger audiences care less about cutting-edge graphics, don't be shocked if the lower-budget likes of Split Fiction and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 end up stealing the thunder away from glossier tentpole games.
If AAA can't thrive in a year with so much apparent quality on the horizon, then the future of the industry must surely lie elsewhere.