Following the disastrous collapse of 38 Studios and its subsidiary Big Huge Games, hundreds of employees were left looking for work. Today Epic Games confirmed it's founding a new studio, Epic Baltimore, featuring many of the former employees of Big Huge Games.
Polygon discovered the news after obtaining an internal letter from Michael Capps, Epic's president, that went out to all Epic's employees. In the letter, Capps stated the former Big Huge Games employees wanted to start a new studio to keep its staff together. The new studio is looking at using an Epic franchise in their first game, Capps said.
On Wednesday, the ex-BHG leadership team contacted us. They wanted to start a new company and keep together some of the key talent displaced by the layoff, and hoped that they could use an Epic IP as a starting point for a new game. We loved that they all wanted to keep working together, but it was pretty clear they'd have trouble building a demo and securing funding before their personal savings ran out.
In one of life's coincidences, Epic's directors had spent the morning discussing how we'd love to build even more successful projects with our growing team, but that we'd need a dramatic infusion of top talent to do so. Which, we all knew, was impossible.
So now we're planning to start an impossible studio in Baltimore.
The amount of former Big Huge Games employees joining Epic Baltimore is currently unknown, but Polygon's sources have informed the site that many of the former company's 80 employees will join the new studio.
Epic still has numerous additional details to work out as well, such as obtaining equipment for the new studio and determining where it will be located. Until these details are worked out, Epic will bring the former Big Huge Game employees to its main office in Cary, North Carolina, as contractors.
Source: Polygon
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