Former Dragon Age creative director Mike Laidlaw has found a new home at a new studio: the Quebec City-based Yellow Brick Games.
Laidlaw announced the formation of Yellow Brick today alongside co-founders Thomas Giroux, Frédéric St-Laurent B, and Jeff Skalski. Laidlaw is the studio's new chief creative officer, while Giroux, St-Laurent, and Skalski will serve as CEO, game director, and COO respectively. The studio's website shows 13 current employees, but GamesIndustry reports that the studio's already grown to 15 people.
"We believe very strongly in creating digital playgrounds," the studio's mission statement reads. "The more interactivity and freedom a game can give to a player, the more immersive and compelling it can be, so long as there are clear rules that guide those interactions. We feel that a truly emergent game can engage players through their own creativity and will offer tools that let our players share those experiences."
"Based in Quebec City, Yellow Brick Games was founded by video games industry veterans with the goal of leadership in the new trend of Triple-I development: focused, high-quality titles that put the player experience first," Yellow Brick's homepage adds. "Developing both innovative gameplay and original IPs, our team also puts a strong emphasis on work/life balance as we believe fulfilled team members deliver the best content."
"The market for independently produced games is growing rapidly and the technology is keeping pace," Laidlaw said (via Game Informer). "Small, diverse teams can now create high-quality experiences. For veterans of big-studio productions like myself and much of our team, this is the perfect time to get back to a small, agile, and highly motivated group. We want our games here at Yellow Brick to take potentially millions of players on wondrous journeys, and we want every member of our team to have a direct impact on the new worlds we’re creating."
Yellow Brick is brand spanking new and still actively hiring, so while it likely has ideas and perhaps even prototypes floating around, it's yet to announce its first game. Collectively, its co-founders have worked on everything from Assassin's Creed to Tom Clancy to Dragon Age, so there's a wealth of possible genres and themes. When we know more, you'll know more.
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