“This was a pretty simple one - unparalleled team modernizing a beloved genre,” Scott Rupp, a founding partner at Bitkraft Ventures, said in an email to GamesBeat. The team will also empower user-generated content. The studio’s strategy is specifically anchored on lowering the barrier to entry into RTS as well as enhancing co-operative, campaign, and competitive gameplay. If anyone can figure out how to bring RTS back to the forefront of gaming, I think it’s Tim and his team at Frost Giant.”Īs for PC technology pushing RTS games forward, Campbell said that he believes machine learning and AI will make big contributions, and improvements in automated coaching tips will be important for making the games more accessible.įrost Giant Studios plans to advance the RTS genre by applying what the team has learned from player feedback and player behavior over the past decade. He added, “Ever since we published Ensemble’s Age of Empires, I’ve had a soft spot for the RTS genre. My favorite was in the mid-1990s when the common wisdom was the RPG genre was dead and soon after Diablo shipped.” “I’ve heard it so many times in my career and it’s always been wrong. “I guess I’m always suspicious when I hear people say a genre is dead,” Ed Fries, a former head of Microsoft Game Studios and founder of 1Up Ventures, said in an email to GamesBeat. Morten said that the new company is focused on the PC platform. So the potential audience for them isn’t as big as titles that can be spread across multiple platforms. One of the challenges is that RTS games are best played with a mouse and keyboard, meaning the PC is their primary platform. Riot Games, for instance, has introduced Frost Giant to its senior game designers. He said the investors who funded the deal have been very helpful, as they all bring the experience of making games to the table. I put Morten in touch with some of the game investors. “It’s incredible to me how that funding ecosystem for games has grown and continues to flourish.” “I knew that it was time for me to move on from Blizzard, and I saw I was in parallel exploring if it was possible to raise funding for a new RTS,” Morten said. It’s more that it has other franchises to invest in, like Overwatch, Diablo, and World of Warcraft. It’s not so much that Blizzard doesn’t like RTS games anymore. But I think all of us had a lot of love for Blizzard that made it a difficult decision to go this route,” Morten said. “In order to build another brand-new RTS, it felt like the opportunity to do it externally was too good to pass up. Those games were among the most successful RTS titles of all time, but Morten felt he had to leave Blizzard to work on another RTS. Campbell was the original lead campaign designer for Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne. Morten was the production director on Blizzard’s StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void, which came out in 2015 and was the final expansion for StarCraft II. Morten said the Irvine, California-based team has eight employees - all who once worked at Blizzard - and four contractors. They will use the money to grow the team, build a prototype for gameplay, conduct consumer research, and expand operations. Bitkraft Ventures led the round, with participation from 1Up Ventures, GC Tracker, Riot Games, and Griffin Gaming Partners.
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