A new studio has appeared!
Gardens is a brand new game development studio, announced today and founded by Chris Bell, Lexie Dostal and Stephen Bell – a team that have individually worked on Journey, What Remains of Edith Finch, and Dustforce. Joining them is a talented team of developers with credits on the likes of Spider-Man, Ratchet & Clank, Skyrim and Fallout – and that kind of talent alone is enough to pique our interest. But what makes Gardens a studio to watch?
Well, Gardens intends to be “transparent, sustainable, inclusive and empowering”; all very nice words that leave a warm, fuzzy feeling inside us. “With Gardens, we wanted to create a studio that cares as much about the health, happiness, and wellbeing of its team members as we do the craftsmanship of the games we create together,” says co-founder Chris Bell. “Our top priority is making sure our teammates enjoy their lives and are given the tools and resources to grow while creating compelling, well-crafted, thoughtful games that cultivate novel shared experiences between players online.”
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Gardens is based in Portland and Los Angeles, but it will be functioning as a fully remote studio. That means it can make use of a wide range of talent regardless of a person’s geographical location.
The studio is yet to announce what it’s working on, but it has been set up to create “vibrant online games that foster meaningful multiplayer moments and relationships between players around the world”. We’re interested to see how that materialises into a debut title. If the art style of the key art atop this article and the illustrations dotting Gardens’ official website are anything to go on, we’re expecting something truly beautiful. Hopefully we won’t have to wait long to hear more from the team.
If you like the sound of what Gardens is setting out to achieve and are in the game development business, the studio is currently hiring for multiple roles. It’s looking for various artists, animators and engineers, and you can see the full list of open positions by clicking here.
