New studio made up of EA and Ubisoft veterans – That’s Gaming

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Moon Rover Games, a new development studio founded by a team of veterans from EA and Ubisoft, announced its launch today. The studio is dedicated to creating immersive cooperative games set in emerging worlds where players can share their unexpected gameplay moments and stories.

Moon Rover Games’ founding team includes Jamie Keen as creative director, Julien Wera as CEO, Ben Keen as technical director and Christofer Emgård as narrative director, with experience in leadership positions at franchises such as Far Cry, Battlefield, Tom Clancy’s The Division, Mirror’s Edge, Crusader Kings and many others.

The studio is currently working on an ambitious cooperative action game set in an original IP. Their goal is to use the lessons the team has learned while working on system-driven titles such as Battlefield and Far Cry to create a universe where players can experience unexpected, emergent gameplay moments.

“Our vision is to create engaging games in immersive worlds that form around players,” said Jamie Keen, creative director of Moon Rover Games. “We are passionate about building system-driven games, story generators where unexpected things happen, allowing players to experience their own personal stories in a world created for them.”

“We stand on the shoulders of giants and are grateful for the opportunity to apply what we have learned working on some of the world’s greatest games to building healthy foundations for a new company,” said Julien Wera, CEO of Moon Rover Games. “Today’s tools combined with our team’s experience give us the opportunity to build ambitious action games while maintaining a creative and people-driven culture where everyone can have impact and autonomy.”

Technical Director Ben Keen highlights the opportunities available today through technology, specifically for new studios and smaller teams, “The power of today’s commercial game engines and development tools allows for tremendous acceleration of early prototyping and development. This allows us to quickly find the fun and then build large, ambitious games without the need for a team of a hundred. Moon Rover’s approach to technology is focused on delivering great gameplay experiences, which is why we use Epic Games’ Unreal Engine 5, but also develop our own technology only where it has the most impact on the game.”

Moon Rover Games believes in the importance of maintaining a medium-sized studio to foster impact, influence and autonomy for all team members. By using modern technologies such as off-the-shelf game engines and AI, Moon Rover Games believes that moderately sized teams can create AAA quality projects without growing to hundreds of employees. By keeping their team size manageable, the studio hopes to foster a creative, collaborative and inclusive environment. Moon Rover Games is committed to delivering innovative and high-quality gaming experiences while maintaining a people-focused approach to development.