During Gamescom 2026, we had the opportunity to sit down with Rob Pardo, one of the veterans of the video game industry and a key figure behind some of Blizzard Entertainment’s most iconic games. Today, Pardo is part of Bonfire Studios, where he is working on the studio’s upcoming game, Arkheron.
Our conversation covered the development of Arkheron, the relationship between developers and players, the challenges of releasing games in today’s crowded market, Early Access, cross-play, and the philosophy behind Bonfire Studios’ development process.
“You have to make something you really love”
One of the main topics we discussed was how much developers should listen to their players. According to Pardo, it is not a matter of choosing between a developer’s own vision and the expectations of the community.
Nikola BuffGaming: In a previous interview, you said that you listen to your players. How important is that during development? Should developers make the game they personally want to play, or do they have to think about what the players want?
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: I would say it’s “yes, and,” not either-or.
I firmly believe that, during development, you need to make something that you really love making and playing. I think that’s foundational.
But you can’t stop there, right? You have to start there because it’s the only way you’re going to have enough passion and energy to finish a game.
But then I don’t think you should just do that and launch the game. What I believe in is bringing it to an audience before you launch, so that they can become part of the playtesting cycle.
You can start listening to them and determine whether you’ve hit the mark and whether your vision is going in the right direction.
It is easier to make a game, but harder to stand out
With more games being released than ever before, getting a project in front of an audience has become one of the biggest challenges facing developers.
Nikola BuffGaming: Do you think it’s harder to publish a game today, or was it harder three years ago?
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: It’s way easier in some ways and way harder in others, you know what I mean?
From a purely mechanical point of view, it’s so much easier than it has ever been. I come from the “dinosaur days,” when you had to manufacture a box and a CD, and you had to get it distributed to stores.
In that way, it’s much easier.
But that has also lowered the barrier to entry and leveled the playing field, so there’s now so much content. The marketing challenge has therefore become much greater.
Players have more choice than ever
The sheer amount of content available today also means players have more options than ever before.
Nikola BuffGaming: I think players today are more spoiled.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: Well, they have a lot of great content. They have so many things to choose from.
Nikola BuffGaming: Yes, but they complain a lot more.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: I think players have always had a lot of feedback and complaints. I don’t think that has ever changed.
Nikola BuffGaming: Yes, I totally agree. Sometimes there’s no real point to it. There’s a game — you either love it or you don’t.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: The best thing you can do is make a game that you’re proud of and hope that it finds an audience of players who love it the way you do.
Talking about Arkheron
Naturally, our conversation also turned toward Arkheron itself and Pardo’s thoughts on the game after years of development.
Nikola BuffGaming: What do you think about your new game?
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: About Arkheron?
Nikola BuffGaming: Yes.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: I’m excited about it. What do you want me to tell you about it? You got to play it — you tell me about it.
Nikola BuffGaming: They told me I was the best player of the day.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: Oh yeah? What do you play a lot? What’s your gaming background?
Nikola BuffGaming: RPGs.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: RPGs, really?
Nikola BuffGaming: Yes.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: Okay. Then I’m surprised you adapted so quickly.
Nikola BuffGaming: It’s okay. PvP, RPGs — I play everything. It felt natural to me.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: All right.
When will Arkheron enter Early Access?
One of the biggest questions surrounding Arkheron is when players will finally get access to the game. While Bonfire Studios has not announced a specific release date yet, Pardo confirmed that Early Access is planned for later this year.
Nikola BuffGaming: Tell me one more thing. Do you know when you will release the full game?
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: We haven’t announced a release date yet. We’ve only said that we want to enter Early Access later this year.
The way we’ve been developing the game is really aligned around our next major playtesting milestone.
Based on that, we always get a signal about how close we are to launching this thing.
We’re always hopeful that the next playtesting milestone will show us that we’re almost there.
Nikola BuffGaming: Finally.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: Yeah. The next one is September 25, which is the launch of our cross-play test.
That will be the first time we’re able to bring in a broad console audience.
Arkheron on controller
Controller support is also an important part of the experience, particularly for players who prefer playing games without a keyboard and mouse.
Nikola BuffGaming: Today I played it with a controller.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: Yeah.
Nikola BuffGaming: I don’t like using a keyboard and mouse.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: How did it feel on the controller?
Nikola BuffGaming: I didn’t have any problems at all.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: Awesome.
Nikola BuffGaming: But that’s just me. I mostly play games with a controller. I use a keyboard and mouse for work.
How Bonfire Studios develops Arkheron
Pardo also gave us an insight into the studio’s development philosophy and explained how regular playtesting became a fundamental part of the team’s workflow.
Nikola BuffGaming: Can you describe the process of making your games, especially this game?
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: What part of the process?
Nikola BuffGaming: Every part.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: Every part? We’re going to be here for a very long time.
Nikola BuffGaming: No, no. Just briefly.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: Briefly?
I’m trying to understand what part of the process you mean. For us, we’re very cross-collaborative and very iterative.
One of the fundamental things we did with this game was that, as soon as we had enough of the core technology and the prototype in place, we started playing the game every day as a morning playtest ritual.
What that allowed us to do was this: every morning, we would play the game, which meant that by the afternoon we could start giving feedback to one another and making changes.
Then, on the following day, hopefully some of those changes would already appear in the build.
That’s a pretty fundamental part of our process, and I think it’s quite different from the way many companies work.
We still do a lot of the typical things. You still have to conceptualize a character, model that character in the game, and rig it. There’s still all of that part of the process.
That’s why I wasn’t sure whether you meant the technical process or the development philosophy. There are many different ways to talk about it.
Seasonal content and the Eternals
We also asked Pardo about the game’s seasonal structure and how Bonfire Studios plans to keep Arkheron evolving after launch.
Nikola BuffGaming: I just saw that one of your ideas is a season pass. Do you want to release season passes regularly, or…?
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: What we’re going to do with our version is give it a kind of narrative wrapper — that’s probably the best way to think about it.
We have characters called the Eternals. Basically, each Eternal has a set of four items.
There will be ten Eternals in each chapter, which is what we call our seasons.
With every chapter, we’ll bring two Eternals into the rotation and remove two.
That does a few things for us. It allows us to keep the complexity of the game relatively stable. We can shift the meta, and we can also do cool things with the narrative and the Tower, involving these characters coming into and out of the Tower.
Finding an audience for Arkheron
We wrapped up our conversation by returning to one of the main themes discussed throughout the interview: finding the balance between a developer’s vision and the expectations of the players.
Nikola BuffGaming: That’s it. I could speak with you all day, but…
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: All right. Well, thank you for spending time with me and for checking out the game.
Nikola BuffGaming: Thank you very much.
Rob Pardo – Arkheron: Are you going to continue checking out the game?
Nikola BuffGaming: I will.
Arkheron is currently heading toward another important stage of testing, with the cross-play test scheduled for September 25. While the exact Early Access release date remains unannounced, Bonfire Studios continues to use player feedback and frequent playtesting as a central part of the game’s development.
For now, the biggest question is whether Arkheron can turn that development philosophy into a game that players will love as much as the team behind it does.
