In July, Rock Paper Shotgun’s parent company, Ziff Davis, fired all 36 members of Humble Games in response to “challenging economic times for indie game publishing.” Now founded by former Humble Games CEO Alan Patmore and VP of Global Publishing Mark Nash Good Games Groupa recent independent publisher that will work with many of the same development partners from the Humble days. They have also re-teamed with Ziff Davis, providing support for previously released Humble games.
“Partnering with Ziff Davis allows us to continue working with the great indie developers we’ve worked with at Humble Games, while also allowing us to chart a new course for the future,” Patmore writes on the recent publisher’s website.
This was the case in July Aftermath reported that outside consulting firm Powell Group will assume responsibility for Humble’s remaining publishing projects. It’s unclear whether this was ever the case or still is, but as our colleagues at Ziff Davis point out Eurogamer Please note that several projects published by Humble Games appear on the GGG website, including Carto, Temtem, and Midnight Fight Express.
It appears that a “restructuring” of Humble Games has been planned for some time, after a recording of a conversation with Ziff Davis’ president of technology and acquisitions, Steve Horowitz, was revealed. In the recording, re-posted by Aftermath, he allegedly revealed that ZD had tried to sell the imprint to Humble Bundle twice, but “neither attempt created significant demand and unfortunately neither attempt created a viable offer or result.”
Humble Games’ “restructuring” – which followed a wave of layoffs last November – caused a wave of consternation among the indie developer community. “We are devastated by today’s news of the apparent closure of our publishing partner, Humble Games.” he wrote creators of Signalis. “We have been fortunate to have worked with some truly great people who were laid off in November and today, and we hope they all get back on their feet and find amazing new jobs elsewhere quickly.” It’s nice to find out that at least a few of them do.
