MCV/DEVELOP News, events, research and jobs from the games industry
The head of Tomb Raider developer Crystal Dynamics is leaving the studio after ten years with the company. Darrell Gallagher was also Square Enix’s head of product development and Western studios where in the last year he has overseen the release of Western-made titles such as Life is Strange, Just …
Read More »Rovio names new CEO as Rantala steps down
Rovio has revealed that its CEO Pekka Rantala will be stepping down from his role. Rantala has only served in the position for a year, but will be replaced by Kati Levoranta in early 2016, according toTechCrunch. Levoranta currently serves as chief legal officer. The change was attributed to a …
Read More »Zynga’s Chiang joins Warner to oversee game development
Warner Bros Interactive Entertainment has hired long-running games exec Steven Chiang to take responsibility for its games development ventures. Chiang previously served as studio president at Zynga, where he oversaw development for the company’s free-to-play mobile and Facebook titles. He left Zynga last year. At Warner Bros, Chiang takes up …
Read More »Mind Candy closes Brighton office
Moshi Monsters developer Mind Candy has closed its Brighton office. Games Industry reports that it hasn’t been confirmed how many jobs have been lost as a result, although at the last known headcount 26 employees were based there. The suggestion is that employees will be offered the chance to move …
Read More »Former Joystiq writer Sliwinski joins Bithell Games
Prominent independent developer Mike Bithell has hired a chief operating officer to help run his company, Bithell Games. Announcing the hirevia his blog, the developer named formernews content director at the now-closed Joystiq Alexander Sliwinski as his new COO. It’s time to start some new things,” writes Bithell. It felt …
Read More »Avalanche Studios suffers layoffs ahead of Just Cause 3 launch
Just Cause and Mad Max developer Avalanche Studios has laid off a number of employees at its New York and Stockholm offices. In a statement toGame Informer, a spokesperson said 12 employees had been let go at its US branch. A similar number were also let go at its Sweden …
Read More »MD Mick Morris leaves Audiomotion after 17 years
Audiomotion MD Mick Morris has left the company after 17 years to pursue a new and fresh challenge”. Operations director Brian Mitchell will now take the reins at the Oxfordhire-based studio. Morris joined Audiomotion in 1998, and became MD in 2003 after the company left the GBH/Kaboom group. The mo-cap …
Read More »Testronic has a new CEO
QA and localisation firm Testronic Laboratories has hired Brett Morris as its new chief exec. Morris leaves his previous role as CFO for Catalis Group, the organisation that owns Testronic and UK developer Kuju Entertainment. He has worked at Catalis for four years, alongside CEO Dominic Wheatley. Prior to this, …
Read More »Unity to up its headcount by 500 before the end of the year
Unity’s business is changing, and to support this the company has embarked on a mass recruitment drive. The company has long been one of the major go-to game engines in the industry. But arguably it hasn’t had the huge scale you might expect for the team behind such a widely-used …
Read More »200 jobs under threat at Sega
Sega is set to offer 200 employees ‘voluntary retirement’ as it aims to improve profitability. The publisher expects to make a loss of 9.85m for the second quarter of the 2015 financial year. It has put much of this down to the delay of the release of its newpachislot and …
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