In partnership with
For years, the gaming industry felt like it was splitting into two extremes.
On one side, you had massive AAA productions with budgets rivaling Hollywood films. These games took five, six, sometimes even ten years to develop. Hundreds of developers worked on them, and publishers needed millions of copies sold just to break even.
On the other side, indie games exploded in popularity. Small teams created unique experiences, often finding huge success through creativity rather than budget.
Caught in the middle was something that seemed destined to disappear: the AA game.
But lately, something interesting has been happening.
AA games are making a comeback.
What Exactly Is a AA Game?
AA games sit somewhere between indie and AAA titles.
They're bigger than most indie projects but don't have the enormous budgets of blockbuster releases. They often come from mid-sized studios and focus on delivering a strong core experience rather than trying to be everything at once.
Think of games that prioritize gameplay over cinematic spectacle.
For a while, many publishers abandoned this space. The logic seemed simple: if you're spending money, why not spend even more and chase a massive hit?
The problem is that strategy hasn't worked out as well as many hoped.
The New Wave of AA Games
Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
The return of AA gaming isn't just a theory. We're already seeing it happen.
Take Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice. While it looked like a AAA blockbuster, it was developed by a relatively small team at Ninja Theory on a much smaller budget than most major releases. The game focused on delivering a memorable story and stunning presentation without trying to become a massive open-world experience.
More recently, games like Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 have shown that players are hungry for focused, polished experiences that don't require hundreds of millions of dollars to create.
Then there are titles like A Plague Tale: Innocence and A Plague Tale: Requiem, which delivered cinematic experiences that rivaled many AAA games without requiring blockbuster budgets.
These games occupy a sweet spot. They're ambitious enough to feel premium, but small enough to remain financially realistic.
And judging by recent successes, players seem more than willing to support them.
We hired one colleague for every department.
Last Tuesday, marketing asked Viktor to write the weekly campaign recap, pull performance from Google Ads and Meta, and format it as a PDF for the exec team. Done in four minutes.
That same afternoon, engineering asked Viktor to review three open pull requests on GitHub, cross-reference with the Linear sprint board, and flag anything blocking the release. Posted to private channel before standup.
At 9pm, ops asked Viktor to draft a vendor contract summary from three Notion docs and send it to the team. It was in #ops by morning.
None of them knew the others were using it.
Same colleague. Three departments. That's what changes when your AI coworker lives in Slack, where your whole company already works. It's not a tool one person logs into. It's a teammate everyone messages.
5,700+ teams. SOC 2 certified. Your data never trains models.
"Viktor is now an integral team member, and after weeks of use we still feel we haven't uncovered the full potential." - Patrick O'Doherty, Director, Yarra Web
Perhaps the best example of the AA revival is RoboCop: Rogue City.
Why AA Games Are Returning
AA games offer something the industry desperately needs: flexibility.
A smaller budget means lower risk.
Developers can experiment more freely. They can focus on specific strengths instead of trying to check every possible feature box. They don't need to sell ten million copies to be considered successful.
Players seem to be responding to this approach.
Many gamers are tired of bloated open worlds filled with repetitive content. They don't necessarily want a 200-hour experience. Sometimes they just want a focused, well-crafted game that respects their time.
Could This Be Gaming's Future?
AAA games aren't going anywhere.
Neither are indie games.
But the middle ground suddenly looks more important than it has in years.
As development costs continue to rise and publishers search for sustainable business models, AA games may become one of the industry's most valuable categories.
It's ironic.
For years, the AA game was viewed as something outdated, stuck between two worlds.
Now it might be exactly what the gaming industry needs.
Maybe the future of gaming isn't bigger.
Maybe it's smarter.
-Foures
Stop making AI decisions in the dark.
Leadership is asking: where is AI delivering value for us and where is it creating risk? Right now, most teams have no idea.
With Harmonic Security’s Usage Explorer, you get a complete picture of how your organization actually uses AI, automatically categorized into custom use cases with complete tool-level granularity.