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thatgamecompany

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thatgamecompany, LLC
Company typePrivate
IndustryVideo gaming
FoundedMay 2006
HeadquartersLos Angeles, CA, U.S
Key people
Kellee Santiago, President
Jenova Chen, Creative Director
Robin Hunicke, Producer
Nicholas Clark, Lead Designer
Bryan Singh, Designer
John Edwards, Lead Engineer
Martin Middleton, Programmer
Rick Nelson, Engineer
Matt Nava, Art Director
Jacky Jiang, Artist
Number of employees
10 (as of Oct. 2009)
Websitewww.thatgamecompany.com

thatgamecompany is an American independent video game developer co-founded by University of Southern California Interactive Media Division students Kellee Santiago, Jenova Chen and Nicholas Clark. The studio is currently a second-party developer with Sony Computer Entertainment to create three downloadable games for the PlayStation Network service.

The first of these games is a completely remade version of the developer's award-winning Flash title flOw, enhanced with high-definition visuals and sound, added multiplayer modes and full compatibility with the PlayStation 3's motion sensing controller. The title was released on the PlayStation Store on February 22, 2007. The company's second PlayStation 3 game, Flower, was released on the PlayStation Store on February 12, 2009. As of October, 2009, thatgamecompany employs ten people.[1]

History

Seven students with four advisors at the Division of Interactive Media at the University of Southern California School of Cinema and Television created the game Cloud, with version 1.0 being released in November, 2005.[2] The servers that hosted Cloud crashed multiple times in November, 2005.[3] The current version of Cloud (1.43) was released on March 14, 2006.

After seeing Cloud, Sony Computer Entertainment approached some future members of thatgamecompany and asked them to form a company and signed them on to make three downloadable games for the PlayStation 3. thatgamecompany was created on May 15, 2006.[4] Cloud ended up being a game that wouldn't be possible for a company as small as thatgamecompany to make, so they made flOw instead.

flOw was originally a Flash game for the PC/Mac, released as a part of Jenova Chen's thesis entitled flOw In Games, showing his theory of Embedded Difficulty Adjustment.[5] thatgamecompany have stated that their games should "communicate different emotional experiences the current video game market is not offering".[1] flOw, thatgamecompany's first PlayStation 3 game was released on February 22, 2007 in North America, March 23, 2007 in Europe, and May 11, 2007 in Japan. In September, 2007, an expansion pack for flOw for the PS3 was released, and it was created by SuperVillain Studios.[6] A direct port of flOw on the PlayStation Portable, also created by SuperVillain Studios, was released in March 2008.[7] flOw was also the best selling game on the PlayStation Network in the North American region in 2007, and was the fifth best selling game on the PlayStation Network in 2008.[8][9]

The second PlayStation 3 game by thatgamecompany, Flower, was released on the PlayStation Store on February 12, 2009. Flower was well received and is ranked as the #1 game in IGN's Top 10 PlayStation Network games.[10] Thatgamecompany is now working on its third PS3 game, Journey, set to be released in 2011, and Austin Wintory is returning to compose the soundtrack.

Games

Game Title Release Date Platform
Cloud 2005[11] Windows
Flow 2006 Windows
2006 Mac OS
February 22, 2007 [12] PlayStation 3
March 2008 [7] PlayStation Portable
Flower February 12, 2009[13] PlayStation 3
Journey TBA 2011[14] PlayStation 3

Employees

thatgamecompany began in March 2006 with three employees, and has since expanded into ten employees, as of October 2009. Those employees are:[1]

  • Kellee Santiago, President
  • Jenova Chen, Creative Director
  • Nicholas Clark, Lead Designer
  • John Edwards, Lead Engineer
  • Martin Middleton, Engineer
  • Rick Nelson, Engineer
  • Matt Nava, Art Director
  • Jacky Jiang, Artist
  • Robin Hunicke, Producer[15]
  • Bryan Singh, Technical Designer

Past employees have included:

  • Vincent Diamante, Music & Sound Design [16]
  • Austin Wintory, Music & Sound Design [17]
  • Jonathan Blow, Graphics Programmers [17]

References

  1. ^ a b c "Thatgamecompany About Page". Thatgamecompany. Retrieved 2009-02-27.
  2. ^ http://intihuatani.usc.edu/cloud/cloudteam.htm
  3. ^ http://intihuatani.usc.edu/cloud/game.htm
  4. ^ Happy Birthday, TGC! - TGC Blog
  5. ^ http://www.jenovachen.com/flowingames/thesis.htm
  6. ^ http://ps3.ign.com/objects/142/14220223.html
  7. ^ a b http://www.gamespot.com/psp/puzzle/flow/review.html
  8. ^ http://www.joystiq.com/2008/02/21/gdc08-the-top-psn-downloads-since-launch/
  9. ^ http://www.gamingtarget.com/article.php?artid=9221
  10. ^ http://au.ps3.ign.com/articles/985/985833p1.html
  11. ^ thatgamecompany
  12. ^ PlayStation.com - PLAYSTATION3 - Store - Featured Items
  13. ^ "Flower to blossom next month". Qj.net. 2009-01-08.
  14. ^ Flower dev doing online adventure
  15. ^ http://thatgamecompany.com/general/robin-hunicke-joins-tgc/
  16. ^ http://thatgamecompany.com/games/flower/
  17. ^ a b http://thatgamecompany.com/games/flow/
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