Hothead Games closes it’s doors

Closure, deathspank, games, gaming, hothead games, News, Shutting Down, video-games

Another unfortunate shutdown has occurred as Vancouver based Indie studio Hothead games has announced its closure. The studio which opened back in 2006 with former Radical Entertainment devs released some memorable titles such as the hilarious DeathSpank series of RPGs, though they largely focused on mobile games in the 2010s

Hothead Games Developed The DeathSpank Series.

The closure comes as a result of losing publisher funding on a AAA project the studio was working on. After both publishers pulled out, the studio had no choice but to file for bankruptcy.

CEO Ian Wilkinson had this to say.

“We had an amazing playable for an AAA property and had hoped to secure a contract to develop both mobile and console/PC versions of this game with different publishers,” wrote Wilkinson. “Unfortunately, it took far longer than expected to secure contracts for these versions of the game.

“They were both ready to close two weeks ago and then the mobile publisher pulled out due to a change in strategy. Two weeks later, the console publisher also pulled out. At that point, our only remaining option was bankruptcy.”

Hothead may have flown under the radar of many gamers, but I remember buying the DeathSpank games and Swarm back on the 360 and had quite a bit of fun with both. It’s never fun to hear about another studio closing, especially with the high rate of job loss the industry is currently facing, as we covered in an article at the beginning of the month.

I do recommend checking out the DeathSpank games as they are still available on steam. Hopefully the developers at Hothead can find work elsewhere.

DeMandre "LetalisVenator" Pressley

A lifelong gamer who enjoys playing on every platform. Eventually, I grew to love fighting games in particular and began to compete and even win competitions for some games, primarily the 2013 revival of killer instinct. Outside of gaming I also have aspirations of being a comic book artist with a few ideas of my own im developing in my head. When reviewing any game I try to keep my mind open and avoid nitpicking too much. It takes a lot for something to detract me from truly enjoying it so I may not focus on smaller details the way some others might do. I enjoy almost any genre, just don't ask me to play horror games or puzzle games.