Matt Webster’s career once seemed destined to stay within the walls of Electronic Arts. He started at the company in 1990 and spent almost twenty years collaborating with Criterion, the studio behind Burnout and Need for Speed, after EA acquired it in 2004. In early 2023, however, Webster teamed up with fellow Criterion alumni—Steve Uphill, Pete Lake, Andrei Shires and Alan McDairmant—to launch an independent studio in the United Kingdom called Fuse Games. Just over three years later the fledgling studio is poised to ship its debut title, *Star Wars: Galactic Racer*, which will be published by the newly autonomous label Secret Mode.
The release arrives roughly 24 years after the last Star Wars‑themed racing game, *Racer Revenge* (2002), and it does so at a time when the racing genre has generally lost some of its mainstream momentum. Amazon recently walked away from a publishing agreement with Maverick Games for the upcoming title *Clutch*, with Amazon Games head Jeff Gattis stating that the market simply didn’t have a clear fit for the product. Meanwhile Criterion itself has shifted focus away from pure racing projects toward the *Battlefield* franchise. Despite these signals, Webster remains convinced there is still a hungry audience for a Star Wars racing experience.
“Clearly we think there’s an audience for a Star Wars racing game,” he told GamesIndustry.biz. “We’re not the only ones who feel that, and the response we get from people watching our videos and reading our articles suggests we’re not alone.” He adds that genre popularity tends to be cyclical. “We went through a phase where shooters dominated, but that’s only one part of the picture.
As more people play video games, even the tiniest niches can find a larger following.” Webster believes gamers are searching for "fun, interesting, compelling new experiences that they haven’t seen before," and he feels *Galactic Racer* delivers exactly that. The studio’s vision was to capture the instant‑gratification feel of classic arcade racers while also asking, “What can we do when we’re no longer bound by tyres and tarmac?” The answer, according to Webster, includes tracks that wind up the side of an active volcano and courses that feel more like roller‑coasters than traditional circuits. Beyond the high‑octane thrills, the game also seeks to upend long‑standing racing conventions.
Most racing titles have relied on a car‑collection model for the past two decades; *Galactic Racer* intends to discard that formula and borrow mechanics from other genres. One of the most striking innovations is the emphasis on meaningful consequences.
In many modern racers, a rewind button can erase mistakes, diluting the impact of crashing. Fuse Games wants to bring the weight of failure back, making each crash matter.
The design draws inspiration from roguelike titles such as *Hades*, *Returnal* and *Slay the Spire*, which are built around infinite replayability. “Racing thrives on replayability, so marrying it with roguelike principles feels like a match made in heaven,” Webster explains.
If a player crashes too often, they are sent back to the start of a run, but they retain a portion of meta‑progress, emerging from the reset in a slightly stronger position. This creates a tension between risk and reward: “When you’re on your last crash and the systems are critical, you literally lean forward and think about the gamble you’re taking.” It’s a deliberate departure from the hand‑holding that has become common in AAA titles, and Webster acknowledges the challenge of standing out in a crowded market, especially in a year that will see the launch of *GTA 6*.
*Galactic Racer* is slated for an October 6 release, comfortably ahead of *GTA 6*’s November 19 launch but still close to other major releases such as *Control: Resonance* and *Silent Hill: Townfall* on September 24. Webster notes that busy September windows are nothing new; he recalls industry chatter about “Murderer’s Row” in past years when October was packed with high‑profile launches. He says Fuse Games approaches the competition with “a healthy sense of confidence, tempered by a realistic view of how things may turn out.” The conversation turns to the broader industry climate, particularly the wave of layoffs that has swept through studios. Webster, who has witnessed a previous round of cuts about fifteen years ago, observes that great teams make great games, and great games find an audience.
He argues that the current risk‑averse atmosphere actually creates opportunities for developers willing to take calculated bets. “If you’re not willing to risk, you limit your own possibilities,” he says. Funding, however, remains a hurdle for new independent studios.
When Fuse Games announced its formation in early 2023, many questioned the wisdom of launching a studio in that environment. Webster recalls the skepticism: “People were like, ‘You’re brave doing an independent studio in 2023.’” After 32 years at EA, he found himself navigating a completely new landscape. He leaned on principles he’d learned over his career: build a strong team, refine a clear creative vision, create a disciplined plan (while knowing the plan will inevitably change), and stay true to core values.
Engaged and motivated talent, he says, is the engine that drives great games. Fuse’s core team is relatively small—about 75 people—for a project with AAA ambitions. This size is intentional; the studio wants to avoid the boom‑and‑bust staffing cycles that plague many developers. Instead, Fuse relies heavily on external partners to fill skill gaps.
“We’re not doing that grow‑shrink‑grow‑shrink process,” Webster explains. “Our model could become the way AAA games are built in the future: a lean permanent core plus trusted external studios that share our values.” External collaboration ranges from pure outsourcing—transactional asset creation—to deep co‑development, where partner studios sit in Fuse’s daily stand‑ups, Slack channels, and code repositories, essentially becoming extensions of the internal team. The UK, with its mature game‑development ecosystem, proves especially fertile for such partnerships. In the past, studios were reluctant to help each other, but today many companies hire developers who enjoy rotating between projects, keeping the workforce fresh and enthusiastic.
Webster believes this hybrid model allows a studio to deliver a game of AAA scope, scale and visual fidelity on a sustainable budget. The rapid development timeline of *Galactic Racer*—just three and a half years from Fuse’s inception to a near‑complete product built on Unreal Engine 5—demonstrates the viability of the approach. The studio’s roster blends veteran Criterion talent with a wave of younger developers, some of whom have never worked in games before.
One producer on *Galactic Racer* is a complete newcomer to the industry. “We are thrilled with the young talent we’ve got,” Webster says. “They’re often smarter and more effective than I was at that age, and we’ve had greater success with them than with some senior hires.” He notes that seasoned developers sometimes prefer working alongside equally senior colleagues, which can limit mentorship opportunities.
By focusing on nurturing younger staff, Fuse hopes to create a more dynamic and motivated environment. Looking ahead, Webster would like to establish an intern program to further cultivate fresh talent, though he acknowledges the studio is still pre‑revenue.
He cites Criterion’s successful internship initiatives as a model and stresses the importance of entering such programs with “eyes wide open” about the costs involved. Reflecting on the industry’s past excesses, Webster remembers a period when successful games generated enough cash for their creators to spin off new studios—often with mixed results. He argues that money should have been allocated to strong teams rather than to a myth of the singular creative visionary, which he dismisses as “fucking bullshit.” In reality, games are collaborative creations.
As for Fuse’s next steps, Webster admits the future is still being written. The launch of *Star Wars: Galactic Racer* is just the beginning, and while the studio has ideas for future projects, it remains committed to staying flexible and adaptable in a constantly shifting independent‑developer landscape.