Earlier this week, Stellaris: Galaxy Command, a mobile spin-off of the sci-fi grand strategy game, was launched in beta. Less than 24 hours later, it was pulled, when it was found to contain assets that were just altered images from the Halo series. Paradox spoke about the incident at PDXCON, discussing that while this situation is unpleasant, the company still wants to be working in mobile.
Speaking during a press junket at PDXCON 2019, Ebba Ljungerud, CEO of Paradox, took a question on Galaxy Command, responding that Paradox’s interest in the area hasn’t waned any. “We fucked up, clearly, let’s just be honest about that,” she said. “We think Gamebear, the studio, built a really good game. We want to try mobile. We’ve been saying for years that there has to be something we can do with our games in mobile.”
“[Gamebear] are incredibly passionate about Stellaris,” she continued. “There is a good fit in there, but then in the execution, clearly, there’s more work to be done, which is why the game was pulled.”
Shams Jorjani, Paradox Chief Business Development Officer, added that out-sourcing mobile development remains the smarter option considering Paradox’s specific expertise. “It is insanity to have a team world class at PC games go and make a mobile game,” He said. “It makes no sense.”
Ljungerud pointed out that the Stellaris’ console ports are also made by a third party studio, Tantalus Media, and that was also a very clear step for Paradox when moving to console. “[Stellaris] is working really well on console, but we didn’t know that when we took it out,” she said.
Stellaris’ new DLC, Federations, was announced at PDXCON.
Correction: an earlier version of this article quoted Ljungerud as saying “it’s fucked up” of Stellaris: Galaxy Command, not “we fucked up.” We apologise for the error.