Montreal developer Alex Masse's independently produced life-simulation game Paralives sold more than a million copies within a month of its May release, despite job losses across the gaming sector.
The independently produced Canadian game “Paralives” has defied industry headwinds, selling more than a million copies within a month of its May release, according to reporting from BNN Bloomberg and CTV News.
Montreal developer Alex Masse said he pumped “two years of personal savings” into making Paralives, which began as a “solo project” but now employs 15 people. He began by launching prototypes online, telling the Montreal International Game Summit audience, “On my social media page, I had one like. It was my mom.”
After gaining attention on YouTube, Masse quit his part-time job as a game developer at Unity Technologies and devoted himself full-time to Paralives. He raised funds on the Patreon platform and, after six years of testing, tweaking and retesting, launched Paralives in May.
“We had 200,000 bugs at first when it was released, it was a bit overwhelming,” Masse said, adding that he expects to roll out a first major update in a few weeks.
The video game industry has been shaken by job losses and growing threats from artificial intelligence. Montreal, a gaming hub since the 1990s, is home to 250 gaming studios, several of which have had layoffs this year. French gaming heavyweight Ubisoft, which opened a Montreal office in 1997, has closed its offices in the Canadian cities of Halifax and Winnipeg.
Participants at the Montreal summit warned that increased use of AI in game creation and development would lead to further job losses. Masse warned aspiring developers that times are tough and that breaking through will not be easy, suggesting they “spend time analyzing the market” before trying to launch a game.
Paralives’ early success shows an independent Canadian studio can find an audience in a life-simulation genre long dominated by “The Sims,” even as broader industry disruption continues.
Sources
This article was drafted with AI assistance and checked against the sources above. Company claims are reported as claims. Cover image is AI-generated.
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