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studios
Studio News
Epic
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This month: Team 17, Pitbull Studio Limited, Zattikka, MTV Paul Bray and Alan Perrie are the two latest recruits at Worms studio Team 17. Bray has become the firm’s finance and operations director, while Perrie will now serve as head of global marketing. The hirings come as part of substantial management shift at Team 17, which has also encompassed several in-house promotions. Debbie Bestwick has been promoted to the dual roles of managing director and sales and marketing director, and Martin Brown will serve as business development director. Paul Kilburn has become head of production and John Dennis will serve as head of design, while Mark Baldwin is now community manager. www.team17.com Pitbull Studios Limited has hired James Parr as its new technical director and Jef Hardy as design director. The studio, which first opened this July, was founded by former Pitbull Syndicate and Midway Newcastle man Robert Troughton. Parr and Hardy both worked at Pitbull Syndicate, where Parr was a co-founder with Troughton. He has over 20 years industry experience, having worked on the Test Drive series, Ferrari Challenge and Wheelman. Following the hirings, Pitbull announced its first game contract as a circus-themed game set to use the next generation of motion controllers. “We were awarded the project because of the level of expertise we have within the company – for something like this our partners, who we can’t reveal just yet, needed to be sure they chose the right people for the job,” Troughton said. “Choosing us simply removes the risk for them. For us, it allows us to hit the ground running with our new studio.” www.3biz.co.uk/pitbull/ Peter Jones and Joel Breton have joined UK-based casual games studio Zattikka as executive producer and EVP of North American operations respectively. Jones has moved to Zattika from Codemasters, where he served as director of production development. He will now be managing Zattikka’s expanding portfolio. Breton has worked in the games industry since 1994 with Sega, GT Interactive, Bethesda, Take-Two and MTV Networks. “Hiring Joel gives us access to his wealth of product and industry knowledge and kick-starts our presence in the US, which is a huge market for us,” said Zattikka CEO Tim Chaney. www.zattikka.com Growing social gaming firm Bigpoint is entering a rapid phase of workforce expansion, with a goal to add 350 to its San Francisco studio. The German-born company this year expanded its office network to the US. Now just six months later, Bigpoint wants to grow the studio by some 80 staff. "Coming to San Francisco has helped us quickly enter and begin competing in the North American online gaming market," said company CEO Heiko Hubertz. Bigpoint currently employs over 500 people across its studio network in San Francisco, Malta and Berlin. www.mtv.co.uk/games
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72 | October 2010
High Score