Don't confuse the wishes, needs and obligations of the developer and the publisher of games.
The developers (Geoff and Co) are funded by a fixed amount by the publisher, and that amount of cash ticks in every month as long as their contract is valid. So the interest of the developer is to have funding from the publisher for as long as possible, and that actually means long development times. And they also want to create good products, because good products means a good rep in the industry, and a good rep in the industry means the possibilty to sign further contracts for other products, and hence more funding.
The publisher on the other hand would want as many products from the developer as possible, because more products means more retail, and more retail means more more cashflow. And more cashflow means larger profits. Furthermore they would want to have the lowest funding expenses possibly, since the lower the funding, the better the this equation looks: Cashflow - funding - other expenses (like the box) = Profits.
People like Geoff and Co have very good reps, so they can ask for pretty high fundings. Now if you really want to reduce funding to a minimum, compared to the profits, and you can't cut the monthly amount,
you cut the amount of months!! It is that simple.
Geoff and Co could care less if the 5 year plan only produced one ultimate game or 10 games. The funding is basically the same. But the publisher would probably go bankrupt if they only had one product to generate cashflow after 5 years of funding. Seriously how many people are ready to pay 150£ for a computer game, when the competition are offering a similar and slightly worse, but still very good product for 30£?
We could also say that they published a game every other year. Again, how many people are ready to pay 60£ for a computer game, when the competition are offering a similar and slightly worse, but still very good product for 30£? The only reason I can see for Geoff and Co to agree to produce 1 game per year, is that is what the publisher demanded it as a part of the the contract, and hence a condition for funding.
So whats Geoff gonna do in the final negotiations? The FIA license is for 5 years. Should he take the contract and produce 5 games? Or should he decline the contract and spend time finding a new publisher? Remember that while he would be looking for a new publisher there can be no game development since there are no funds to pay the bills. So if he found a new publisher willing to sign a different deal after 10 days, things would be fine. But if he found a new publisher after 1 year, he would have lost a year of development (not to mention a year of salary too!), since there would only be 4 years left in the FIA license. And in the end, the final GP version of the game would be 1 year of development poorer.
As I said at the beginning: Don't confuse the wishes, needs and obligations of the developer and the publisher of games.
They have very different agendas!
It's only after we've lost everything, that we are free to do anything.