The director of Tales of Kenzera: Zau learned his most important game development lesson while working with Ridley Scott: 'That's why we're able to make games faster'

Less than two years ago, Surgent Studios was on the brink. Its debut project, the afrofuturist metroidvania Tales of Kenzera: Zau, reviewed well but underperformed commercially. In July 2024, Surgent laid off around a dozen employees. Three months later, it put its entire team on notice for redundancy.

It's a trajectory that's all too familiar in today's games industry. But the story didn’t end as it seemed destined to. Since then, Surgent has released not one, but two games, each completely different from the other.