The cast of Netflix’s in-house video game studio is starting to take shape, and the SVOD giant has just hired a new Riot and Blizzard veteran.
Will Netflix’s Next Game Be A MOBA? In any case, this is the direction that the SVOD giant seems to be taking, which is digging into the biggest studios in the world for the recruitment of its internal video games department.
Cause if you didn’t know now Netflix is just a streaming site. After having adapted heaps of video games into series or films, the American studio acquired Night School in order to develop in-house productions. An ambition linked to the arrival of a gaming section in the subscription.
If for the moment these are only small games, from third-party developers, which are in the catalog, Netflix aims to create a new game internally. And the recruitment was done accordingly. So a few days ago it is Andrew Brownell who announced his arrival.
Former of Boudless Entertainment studio, he mostly worked for many years at Riot Games, and on League of Legends mainly. Formerly in charge of maps and modes, he also worked on gameplay balancing for MOBA. Before that, he had also worked at Blizzard as senior game developer … on a MOBA too, Heroes of the Storm.
While chatting with members of Netflix’s gaming division, I was very inspired by their vision: to create gaming experiences that are primarily about delighting gamers. I see in this effort a real opportunity to shape the future of gaming for the better in the years to come.
In his message, he recalls the other big names who have already signed with Netflix. We thus find there Amir Rahimi, industry veteran and new vice president of Game Studios. He was notably in charge of Zynga, the huge mobile developer. He also went through EA where he was a producer on several licenses. Recently, he had also gone through the presidency of Kabam, another mobile studio.
We also note Leanne loombe, appointed head of external game development at Netflix. A similar journey for her: former EA for 6 years, producer of Need for Speed, then managed by Riot Games for 5 years.
Finally, we recall the recruitment of Mike Verdu, new vice-president of game development and also a veteran of the industry. Director of the Atari studio in the late 90s, he was also vice president and director of EA Los Angeles, creative director of Zynga, president of Kabam studios, vice president of EA Mobile and finally of Facebook for his branch Oculus VR.
As a reminder, there are many bridges between the world of gaming and video at the moment. In September, it was, for example, Brian Wright, former Netflix executive, who took the opposite route, joining Riot Games which wants to develop its “LoL Cinematic Universe”.
Source: www.eclypsia.com
