In a recent announcement it was revealed that the developers behind Warface and Crytek are offically splitting up. Creative director Michael Khaimzon and his team will be leaving Crytek in order to form their own studio Blackwood Games. Crytek said within a statement that “Blackwood will take over all further development of the Warface franchise, including all previously announced updates,” commenting that the big move “an important strategic and structural change.”
This move leaves Crytek with Hunt: Showdown, which is in early access, as their only project in development at the moment. However, chief executive Avni Yerli stated that the change will allow them to focus more on their own core IP’s, enabling “a closer partnership with the game’s publisher, ” as well as plans that they have in store for the future of the company. This statement may suggest that the move has pushed the studio to start planning to put more titles into development.
On the other end, Khaimzon stated that “it was a tough decision to leave Crytek after all these years, but sometimes you need change to evolve.” In regards to how this will affect Warface, he explained “it’s very important for us to focus on developing Warface in a way that lives up to players’ expectations. We have kept the development team intact, and their expertise will allow us to move forward with our plans and ideas.”
Warface is a a free to play first person shooter that initially launched back in 2013 for the PC and then moved to the Xbox 360 the following year. The game eventually gained a battle royale mode before making its way to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One last year. Now that the development team has formed their own studio it will be interesting to see where the newly formed Blackwood Games studio will improve the franchise with their expressed focus on the title.