Thief designer says that the immersive sim audience is too small for AAA games: ‘There’s quite a few of us who think the way to do it is be III or AA’
Veteran immersive sim designer Randy Smith Evergreen argues that the genre is fundamentally misaligned with AAA game development economics. Speaking to PC Gamer, Evergreen—whose credits include Thief: The Dark Project, System Shock 2, Dark Messiah: Might and Magic, Thief 2, and Thief: Deadly Shadows—contends that immersive sims occupy a niche market too small to justify triple-A budgets.
According to Evergreen and other industry designers, contemporary immersive sims are caught in an “arms race” attempting to match the scale and production values of mainstream AAA releases. However, the genre’s historically modest sales figures don’t support this approach, failing to recoup triple-A development costs.
Evergreen advocates for a shift in industry philosophy: immersive sims should be developed as A-tier or AA-tier productions rather than chasing triple-A parity. This positioning would align development budgets with actual market demand while preserving the design philosophy and player experience that define the genre.
The issue reflects broader tensions in game development between market realities and creative ambitions, particularly for specialist genres with devoted but limited audiences. Evergreen’s perspective suggests that financial sustainability and creative integrity may be better served through tier-appropriate production strategies than through attempting to compete at the highest budget levels.