NEWS Ex-Blizzard Employees Get $25 Million Start Up Investment For New Studio

Rob Pardo.
If you were a fan of Blizzard and World of Warcraft before 2014 you might have heard this name a lot. He was the Lead Director for Blizzard's World of Warcraft for awhile and had been with the company for 17 years before his parting in '14. Yesterday there was news that he has started a new studio with some of his old colleagues as well as Nexon America Inc Ex-CEO, Min Kim, called Bonfire Studios.

The $25 Million came from a joint investment from venture capital company Andreessen Horowitz and Riot Games, according to New York Times.
http://goo.gl/ZlsSb1

Pardo has yet to say what the Studio will be working on to start but has stated at the moment he is focusing on hiring more people to help come up with ideas for their first game and has given us a mission statement that reads loud and clear:
"Game developers live the dream scenario where passion meets work. We don't view our week as something to get through so we can really live on the weekend. But often, developers must compromise and decide - do I work on a blockbuster game where I have less personal impact or the gutsy indie studio that struggles to get noticed? Our vision is to create a studio that doesn't require them to choose."

It seems that the investors will be more a silent partner in the process as well giving them freedom to create games without adhering to a larger company as Pardo goes on to say:

"To give us the ability to operate with independence and create the games we want, we had to find amazing investors. If we are going to create a superhero team, we needed our version of Shield. After all, superhero bases are not free. But we needed more than financial backing, we wanted true partners that could give us sage advice about the road ahead, connect us to future partners and most importantly who share our vision for Bonfire Studios.”

I personally can't wait to see what this studio can do and I'll be following them with great anticipation. ​

 

This could definitely be fantastic. When I saw the info on it I just had to do a news post on it. I really am eagerly awaiting the announcement of their first game.

 

Well Blizzard has recently shown consoles some love the last couple years as well, so hopefully this new studio will take the hint and follow suit as well!