Airlock Games bootstraps debut title as free-to-play UA costs squeeze AAA studios
Summary
Justin Fischer and Brock Feldman lost their jobs when Warner Bros shut Player First Games in 2025.
They founded Airlock Games to ship What the Stars Forgot without live-service UA spend.
The studio raised just over $25,000 via Kickstarter and declined the $30 million multiplayer route.
Fischer treats bootstrap production as lower risk than scaling a free-to-play title in a cooling market.
01
Fischer's capital allocation thesis
Fischer says user acquisition costs are hard for everybody across free-to-play right now.
He says building small made more sense than raising $30 million for a mass-market multiplayer game.
Airlock Games chose a small-scope sci-fi horror management sim instead of chasing scale.
"We can't control what the publisher scene looks like, but we can control what we're making."
02
Bootstrap economics replace VC backing
Airlock Games is shipping What the Stars Forgot without a dollar of outside investment.
The studio's Kickstarter raised over $25,000, well below typical live-service development budgets.
Fischer and Feldman are covering costs with severance pay from Warner Bros, not equity capital.
Fischer says the pair avoided selling company stakes to keep full control of the product.
03
Broader AAA exodus supports the pivot
More than 58,000 games industry layoffs have occurred since 2022, concentrated in North America.
1UP Ventures' Amir Satvat compares the AAA contraction to the industry's 1983 crash.
Big Dumb Games, founded by former EA, Xbox, PlayStation and Ubisoft veterans, mirrors Airlock's unfunded model.
Co-founder Murray Pannell says contributors there take a profit share instead of a salary.
04
Where the bootstrap thesis meets its limits
Fischer ranks success as staying in business first, growth second, profitability third.
He places becoming millionaires below simply continuing to make games.
Last month more than 700 games launched on Steam in a single week.
Lower UA exposure does not remove the market saturation risk both studios still face.
What this means
For Publishers & Developers: Pitch finishing and marketing-only publishing deals to unfunded ex-AAA studios with near-complete scoped builds.
For UA & Marketing: Shift indie launch budgets toward wishlist-building and streamer coverage months before Steam release dates.
For Service Vendors: Package fixed-price QA, porting and localization bundles with milestone billing for self-funded ex-AAA founders.
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