There was a bit of upheaval in the indie gaming space this July, when game publisher, Humble Games, effectively shuttered its doors due to budgeting concerns at its parent company, Ziff Davis. Back then, the entire staff was laid off when the publisher shuttered its doors. Now, the former Humble Games general manager, Alan Patmore, and ex-global publishing VP, Mark Nash, have come together to form Good Games Group—a game publishing group with more or less the same set of values and goals as Humble Games, but without the corporate oversight.
The new team's first order of business is helping Humble Games support indie titles previously launched under the Humble Games—a task that was apparently given over to a third-party game publisher after the 36-person crew of Humble Games was laid off earlier this year. Given that Good Games Group's first step involves Humble Games and projects that would previously have been worked on by the same team, it seems likely that the same developers that published games via Humble Games will continue to work with Good Games Group.
According to Good Games Group CEO, Alan Patmore, the mission at Good Games Group is to "bring exceptional indie games to the global gaming community," and the new company may have a little more freedom to do so without being under a corporate umbrella, which seemingly didn't have the patience to wait for games to generate revenue. According to an interview with a former staff member around the time of the layoffs, Ziff Davis wanted to see immediate profits from game launches—something that is fairly rare in gaming in general, but apparently even more difficult for a lot of indie games.
Humble Games was previously responsible for some fairly well known indie titles, like Wizards of Legend, Slay the Spire, and Void Bastards. After the restructuring in July that resulted in the layoffs, Humble Games promised continued support for developers with which it already had agreements, and it seemingly outsourced those duties to a company called The Powell Group. Now, Good Games Group will also form part of that support group. It still looks as though Humble Games has left the game publishing space, although Good Games Group will likely fill the void left by the indie publisher.
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The new team's first order of business is helping Humble Games support indie titles previously launched under the Humble Games—a task that was apparently given over to a third-party game publisher after the 36-person crew of Humble Games was laid off earlier this year. Given that Good Games Group's first step involves Humble Games and projects that would previously have been worked on by the same team, it seems likely that the same developers that published games via Humble Games will continue to work with Good Games Group.
According to Good Games Group CEO, Alan Patmore, the mission at Good Games Group is to "bring exceptional indie games to the global gaming community," and the new company may have a little more freedom to do so without being under a corporate umbrella, which seemingly didn't have the patience to wait for games to generate revenue. According to an interview with a former staff member around the time of the layoffs, Ziff Davis wanted to see immediate profits from game launches—something that is fairly rare in gaming in general, but apparently even more difficult for a lot of indie games.
Humble Games was previously responsible for some fairly well known indie titles, like Wizards of Legend, Slay the Spire, and Void Bastards. After the restructuring in July that resulted in the layoffs, Humble Games promised continued support for developers with which it already had agreements, and it seemingly outsourced those duties to a company called The Powell Group. Now, Good Games Group will also form part of that support group. It still looks as though Humble Games has left the game publishing space, although Good Games Group will likely fill the void left by the indie publisher.
View at TechPowerUp Main Site | Source
