The timing couldn’t be more pointed. Just weeks after Avalanche Studios closed its Liverpool location and laid off employees at its Malmo and Stockholm offices, co-founder Christofer Sundberg’s new studio Liquid Swords dropped a teaser for their debut game. It’s a nine-second glimpse of a ruined gray city that looks like Grand Theft Auto 4’s Liberty City crashed into Max Payne’s New York nightmare, and Sundberg isn’t hiding the inspiration. He’s literally calling it Mad Max Payne.
From Just Cause to Just Revenge
Christofer Sundberg co-founded Avalanche Studios and served as the creative force behind the Just Cause series for over a decade. Those games were known for explosive action, chaotic destruction, and Rico Rodriguez causing absurd mayhem across tropical islands. They were loud, colorful, and bombastic. The teaser Liquid Swords just released is the complete opposite. It shows an industrial abandoned city with gray buildings, empty streets, a handful of cars moving through the desolation, and flashes of muted light reflecting off a dirty river.
This isn’t the Avalanche style fans know. When someone on Twitter asked if the game would be grounded like GTA, Mafia, or Red Dead Redemption instead of another fantasy or futuristic game, Sundberg was direct. No fantasy or sci-fi, just respect to those developers who make those types of games. This is more like Mad Max Payne. He later clarified that if Liquid Swords ever made a remaster, it would be GTA 4, imagining what Mad Max Payne would look like. The references are deliberate.
A Narrative-Driven Revenge Story
Liquid Swords describes their first project as a narrative-driven, open-world, hardboiled AAA revenge story built in Unreal Engine 5. The game’s official description promises a dark, gritty story that will get under your skin. Sundberg accompanied the teaser with a mission statement that sounds like something Max Payne would growl in a noir monologue. Be accountable. Work hard. Be human. Win. These aren’t buzzwords. They’re marching orders for a studio trying to do AAA development differently.
The teaser’s accompanying text drives home the tone. It talks about hope being something you pay rent on with violence, about moving out of the grim city shown in the footage. This is bleak, urban storytelling grounded in crime, corruption, and survival. Players expecting bright colors and grappling hooks will be disappointed. This is pavement, rust, and bullet casings.
Zero-Nonsense Game Development
Sundberg founded Liquid Swords in 2020 after leaving Avalanche Studios. The studio’s website explains his frustration with modern AAA development. Game development has become so full of distractions that affect quality and motivation, he wrote. I want to change that. He watched as abstract ideas grew into studios and then games, but everything kept growing and getting louder, drowning out the craft. Meaningless buzzwords. Insatiable stakeholders. Over-complicated processes.
Instead of walking away from the industry, Sundberg rallied. Do it again, do it right, as they say in Swedish. Do it the way we used to when game development was still fun and creative. Liquid Swords caps their team size at 100 employees, calling it the optimal number for zero-nonsense game development. The studio proudly advertises no crunch. Let’s say that again, their website declares. No crunch. They even display Air Jordans in their meeting room, which feels like a middle finger to corporate sterility.
Setting a New Standard
Liquid Swords wants to prioritize creativity over crunch, inclusion over silos, and quality over quantity. This is our world, and these are our terms, the studio manifesto states. The philosophy directly mirrors what Justin Fischer and Brock Feldman said when they left MultiVersus to form Airlock Games. AAA development has become too complex, too bloated, too corporate. Veteran developers are fleeing to indie studios where they can control their creative destinies without answering to quarterly earnings reports and focus group data.
Avalanche’s Troubled Year
The timing of this teaser stings for anyone still at Avalanche Studios. In August 2025, Microsoft canceled Contraband, the 1970s smuggling co-op game that Avalanche had been developing for four years since its E3 2021 announcement. Gameplay was never shown publicly, and active development stopped while the studio evaluated the project’s future. That evaluation apparently concluded with closure because in September 2025, Avalanche announced it would shut down the Liverpool studio entirely while laying off staff at Malmo and Stockholm locations.
The official statement cited current challenges to our business and the industry, which is corporate speak for we can’t afford to keep everyone employed after our only project got canceled. Contraband was the only game listed on Avalanche’s website as a forthcoming title, meaning the studio has no publicly known projects in development. Avalanche hasn’t released a new game since Rage 2 in 2019 and Just Cause 4 in 2018. The studio that once defined explosive open-world action games is now treading water.
A Pattern of Layoffs
This isn’t Avalanche’s first rodeo with layoffs either. In June 2024, the studio closed its Montreal and New York offices, putting roughly 50 people out of work. That makes three studio closures in just over a year. The company declined to specify exactly how many people were affected by the September 2025 Liverpool closure and Swedish layoffs, but given that all Liverpool staff were impacted, the number isn’t small. For context, Avalanche employed hundreds of people across multiple locations at its peak.
Meanwhile, Sundberg’s studio Liquid Swords had its own struggles. In February 2025, they made what they called deeply regrettable layoffs before the studio had even properly announced its first game. NetEase, the Chinese tech giant backing Liquid Swords, forced the cuts. Despite that setback, the team continued working, and the October 2025 teaser shows the project is still alive. It’s a rare example of an indie studio surviving early layoffs and pushing forward.
The GTA 4 Comparisons
Players immediately noticed the teaser’s resemblance to Grand Theft Auto 4’s Liberty City. That game launched in 2008 with a deliberately gritty, desaturated visual style that contrasted sharply with GTA San Andreas’s vibrant West Coast aesthetic. Liberty City felt grimy, oppressive, and hostile. The rain-soaked streets, industrial waterfront, and decaying infrastructure created an atmosphere of urban decay that perfectly matched protagonist Niko Bellic’s dark immigrant story.
Some Twitter users complained that GTA 4 looked better, which is probably nostalgia talking, but it illustrates player skepticism. The disastrous launch of MindsEye, another GTA-inspired game from a Rockstar veteran that failed to deliver on its promises, left sandbox fans burned. Every new urban open-world game now gets compared unfavorably to Rockstar’s output, fair or not. Liquid Swords will need to prove their Mad Max Payne concept has substance beyond the nine-second teaser.
Max Payne’s Influence
The Max Payne half of Mad Max Payne is equally important. Remedy’s noir shooter trilogy defined hardboiled storytelling in games with its graphic novel panels, tortured protagonist, and bullet time gunfights. Max Payne wasn’t just a game about shooting bad guys. It was a revenge tragedy wrapped in metaphors about pain, loss, and the futility of violence. The writing dripped with cynicism and dark humor, making players feel Max’s psychological descent alongside the body count.
If Liquid Swords channels even a fraction of Max Payne’s narrative quality, they’ll stand out. Most open-world games treat story as window dressing between shooting galleries. Actually committing to a dark, gritty, character-driven revenge narrative would be refreshing, especially in Unreal Engine 5 where the visual fidelity can make every raindrop and bloodstain feel oppressive.
What We Don’t Know
The teaser tells us almost nothing concrete. Nine seconds of environmental footage showing a ruined city doesn’t reveal gameplay mechanics, story details, protagonist identity, or even a release window. We know it’s open-world, narrative-driven, and focuses on revenge. We know it’s built in Unreal Engine 5. We know Sundberg wants to capture the tones of Mad Max and Max Payne in an urban setting. Everything else is speculation.
Questions remain. Does the game have vehicles? What’s the combat system? Is it third-person like Max Payne or first-person? How large is the map? Are there side activities or is it purely story-focused? Who are you playing as and who are you getting revenge on? When will we see actual gameplay? Liquid Swords hasn’t answered any of these, which means the teaser exists primarily to announce the project exists and gauge community interest.
The Broader Exodus
Sundberg’s departure from Avalanche fits a broader pattern. Veteran developers with decades of experience at major studios are walking away to form indie teams where they control creative direction. The reasons vary but common threads emerge. AAA budgets have ballooned to unsustainable levels. Development cycles stretch five-plus years. Creative decisions get filtered through so many stakeholders that original visions get compromised beyond recognition. Studios impose crunch despite knowing it destroys lives and families. And when games underperform against unrealistic financial targets, developers get laid off regardless of their talent or dedication.
Liquid Swords, Airlock Games, and countless other indie studios founded by AAA refugees represent a rejection of that system. These developers are betting that smaller teams making focused experiences can succeed where corporate behemoths stumble. Time will tell if that bet pays off, but the exodus shows no signs of slowing. Every major layoff sends more talent toward independence.
FAQs
Who is Christofer Sundberg?
Christofer Sundberg co-founded Avalanche Studios and served as the creative director behind the Just Cause series. After over a decade at Avalanche, he left in 2020 to form Liquid Swords, an indie studio focused on zero-nonsense AAA game development.
What is Mad Max Payne?
Mad Max Payne is how Sundberg describes Liquid Swords’ first game, combining the gritty post-apocalyptic tone of Mad Max with the noir storytelling and urban crime focus of Max Payne. It’s a narrative-driven, open-world revenge story built in Unreal Engine 5.
What happened to Avalanche Studios?
Avalanche closed its Liverpool studio and laid off employees at its Malmo and Stockholm locations in September 2025 following Microsoft’s cancellation of Contraband, the only known game in development. The studio hasn’t released a new title since Rage 2 in 2019.
When does Liquid Swords’ game release?
No release date has been announced. The October 2025 teaser is the first public footage of the game, and Liquid Swords hasn’t revealed a timeline for when more information or gameplay will be shown.
What is Liquid Swords?
Liquid Swords is an indie studio founded by Christofer Sundberg in 2020. The Stockholm-based developer employs up to 100 people and focuses on creativity-driven game development without crunch. Their first project is an open-world AAA revenge game in Unreal Engine 5.
Did Liquid Swords have layoffs?
Yes, Liquid Swords made what they called deeply regrettable layoffs in February 2025 at the direction of NetEase, their financial backer. Despite this setback, the studio continued development on their first game.
Is this a GTA 4 remaster?
No. When a leaker claimed Liquid Swords was remastering GTA 4, Sundberg denied it, saying if they ever made a remaster it would be that one, but they’re making an original game inspired by similar tones and aesthetics.
Why did Sundberg leave Avalanche?
Sundberg left Avalanche because he felt AAA game development had become too distracted by meaningless buzzwords, insatiable stakeholders, and over-complicated processes. He wanted to return to when game development was fun and creative.
What does zero-nonsense development mean?
Liquid Swords defines zero-nonsense development as prioritizing creativity over crunch, inclusion over silos, and quality over quantity. The studio caps team size at 100, eliminates crunch entirely, and focuses on craft over corporate demands.
Conclusion
Christofer Sundberg’s nine-second teaser for Liquid Swords’ debut game arrives at a moment when the AAA game industry is eating itself alive. Avalanche Studios, the company he co-founded, just closed another location and laid off more staff after Microsoft canceled their only project. Meanwhile, Sundberg’s indie studio is building a gritty revenge story that looks like Grand Theft Auto 4 had a baby with Max Payne in the ruins of an industrial nightmare. Whether Mad Max Payne becomes the zero-nonsense AAA experience Sundberg promises or just another ambitious indie that couldn’t stick the landing remains to be seen. The teaser offers more vibes than substance, and nine seconds of environmental footage doesn’t prove the game will deliver on its hardboiled aspirations. But the timing of its release speaks volumes. While Avalanche struggles to survive and Microsoft continues canceling projects, the developer who helped build that studio walked away years ago to do things differently. He’s not alone. Veteran developers across the industry are forming indie studios, rejecting the complexity and corporate oversight that’s suffocating creativity at major publishers. Liquid Swords represents that rebellion. A cap of 100 employees. No crunch. Creativity first. These aren’t radical ideas. They’re how games used to be made before everything got too big, too expensive, and too risk-averse. If Sundberg can deliver a narrative-driven open-world revenge game that captures even a fraction of Max Payne’s storytelling and GTA 4’s oppressive atmosphere, he’ll prove the indie model can compete with AAA productions. The industry needs him to succeed. Not just because Mad Max Payne looks interesting, but because his success would validate the exodus. It would show that talented developers don’t need 500-person teams and nine-figure budgets to make great games. Sometimes all you need is 100 people who give a damn, an Unreal Engine 5 license, and the freedom to build something dark, gritty, and unforgettable.