Here are more than 30 of the most exciting games companies in Washington State

• 1 5th Cell

  

  Office: Bellevue
  Founded: 2003
  Key staff: Jeremiah Slaczka (CEO)
  Key Games: Scribblenauts, Anchors in the Drift
  Website: https://5thcell.com

  Based in Bellevue, 5th Cell is the creator of the hit game series Scribblenauts. First released on the Nintendo DS handheld in 2009, the series has since spread to 3DS, Wii U, PC and most recently PS4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch with Shiver and Warner Bros’ Scribblenauts Showdown.

  In 2016 the studio laid off a large number of staff following the cancellation of a Scribblenauts mobile game, with a small team remaining.

  The studio is currently putting its creative talents to work on mobile game Anchors in the Drift. The adventure game is set in a world where time and space have collapsed, and kingdoms exist across an “endless ocean of time”, known as the Drift.

  
  

• 2 8 Circuit Studios

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2017
  Key staff: James Mayo (CEO)
  Key Games: Alien Arsenal, Mankind Reborn, Project Genesis
  Website: https://8circuitstudios.com/

  Founded by CEO James Mayo in 2017, technology firm 8 Circuit Studios was formed with the goal of building games harnessing blockchain technology.

  8 Circuit’s aim is to “open a new frontier in gaming by building a universe of connected game worlds using the Ethereum blockchain.”

  Project Genesis is the developer's latest project, which has players going up against one another in team versus team space battles where players control a tactical support ship through artificial intelligence.

  8 Circuit Studios CEO James Mayo will be a speaker at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle, which takes place on May 13th to 14th.

  
  

• 3 Amazon Games

  

  Office: South Lake Union
  Key staff: Christoph Hartman (VP)
  Key Games: Lost Within, The Grand Tour Game, Crucible
  Website: www.amazongames.com

  Founded back in August 2012 initially making social games for Facebook, Amazon Game Studios committed to making mid-tier games in 2014.

  To do this, the retail giant hired Portal designer Kim Swift as well as developers who worked on the likes of Far Cry 2 and System Shock 2.

  Many developers left during the firm's first year, with Amazon Game Studios publishing a number of mobile releases such as Lost Within and Sev Zero.

  It wasn't until 2016 that we saw the company's PC games, with Breakaway, Crucible and New World announced at that year's TwitchCon.

  Still, the company managed to attract 2K Games founder Christoph Hartman, who joined in 2018, overseeing the company's three offices in San Diego, Seattle and Orange County.

  
  

• 4 ArenaNet

  

  Office: Bellevue
  Founded: 2000
  Headcount: c. 250
  Key staff: Mike O’Brien (President)
  Key Games: Guild Wars series
  Website: https://www.arena.net/en

  Founded in 2000, ArenaNet is best known for its online RPG series Guild Wars. All three founders of the studio were former employees of Blizzard Entertainment with the trio all working on Diablo, StarCraft and WarCraft.

  In 2002 the Washington-based firm was acquired by NCsoft, with the first Guild Wars launched worldwide in 2005.

  Co-founders Jeff Strain and Patrick Wyatt obtained new roles at NCSoft in 2008, before later leaving the company altogether. Currently, Mike O’Brien is the only founder still with ArenaNet to this day.

  In February the studio laid off 143 people citing the need to cut costs owing to declining revenue, development delays and overheads in the West rising.

  
  

• 5 Big Fish

  

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2002
  Key staff: Jeff Karp (MD and president)
  Key Games: Big Fish Casino
  Website: https://www.bigfishgames.com

  Big Fish Games is one of the largest social casino games publishers in the world. It also publishes games in the casual genre, with its portfolio spanning across mobile, PC and online.

  Its influence is such that in January 2018 Australian casino firm Aristocrat Leisure acquired the company in a deal worth $990 million. At the time of the purchase, Aristocrat CEO Trevor Croker said the move would make it the “second largest social casino publisher globally”.

  Big Fish appointed former EA and Zynga exec Jeff Karp as its new MD and president in July 2018. In September 2018, the firm laid off 15 per cent of its workforce (reportedly around 75 staff) to focus its attention on fewer projects.

  
  

• 6 Bungie

  

  Office: Bellevue
  Headcount: Over 750
  Key staff: Pete Parsons (CEO) Jason Jones (CCO)
  Key Games: Halo series, Destiny
  Website: www.bungie.net

  Since 2001, Bellevue-based Bungie has been working on some of the most iconic sci-fi shooters in the industry.

  The developer began life back in 1991 and was bought by Microsoft in 2000, with its Halo: Combat Evolved project becoming a launch title for the original Xbox.

  Four more entries in the series later and the company span out of Microsoft, going on to work with Activision Blizzard on the sci-fi service project Destiny.

  The first entry debuted in 2014 with a sequel releasing in 2017. Though successful, the franchise wasn't pulling in enough cash for Activision, resulting in Bungie buying the Destiny IP and setting out to forge its own destiny.

  
  

• 7 Camouflaj

  

  Office: Bellevue
  Founded: 2011
  Key staff: Ryan Payton (Founder)
  Headcount: 40
  Key Games: Republique, Marvel’s Iron Man VR
  Website: https://camouflaj.com

  Camouflaj was founded in 2011 by former Metal Gear Solid 4 assistant producer and Halo 4 narrative designer Ryan Payton. His new studio built a name for itself with the episodic stealth game Republique, released across mobile, PC and Mac.

  The team received a development boost after it raised $555,000 from crowdfunding website Kickstarter to build the game. The studio later signed a deal with Puzzle & Dragons creator GungHo to complete development.

  In recent years the company has turned its skills to virtual reality, with Republique VR and the recently announced Marvel’s Iron Man VR.

  
  

• 8 Concerned Ape

  

  Office: Seattle
  Key staff: Eric Barone
  Key Games: Stardew Valley
  Website: https://www.stardewvalley.net

  The name Concerned Ape may not sound familiar straight away, but its hit game surely will. It’s the studio name for Eric Barone, the man who made farming simulation RPG Stardew Valley.

  The game has been a massive success for the indie developer since it was first released in 2016 on PC, after Barone spent years building the Harvest Moon-inspired title.

  Stardew Valley has since spread across platforms, finding success wherever it lands, whether that’s on Nintendo Switch or mobile. The iOS and Android ports were handled by another UK studio, The Secret Police, with the iOS version estimated to have made $1 million as of November 2018.

  
  

• 9 DoubleDown Interactive

  

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2009
  Key staff: Joe Sigrist (GM)
  Key Games: DoubleDown Casino Slots
  Website: https://doubledowninteractive.com

  Seattle has become something of a hub for another sub-section of the mobile games space: social casino. One of the top dogs in the space is Double Down Interactive, which has a solid US top 30 grosser in DoubleDown Casino Slots.

  The company’s impressive portfolio led to South Korean publisher DoubleU Games acquiring it from International Game Technology in 2017 for $825 million.

  The deal puts it in the same league as local competitor Big Fish Games (itself on this list), which was sold for some $990 million.

  Doubledown head of UA Faith Price will be a speaker at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle, which takes place on May 13th to 14th.

  
  

• 10 Epic Games

  

  Office: Bellevue
  Founded: 1991
  Key staff: Tim Sweeney (CEO), Mark Rein (VP)
  Key Products: Fortnite, Unreal Engine
  Website: https://www.epicgames.com

  Epic Games needs little introduction - it’s one of the most famous games companies on the planet. Yet the company is always evolving. It’s no longer the studio that made Gears of War, the Unreal Engine firm is now most well-known for cultural phenomenon Fortnite.

  Thanks to the introduction of a free-to-play battle royale mode, the game quickly turned into a multi-billion dollar money spinner. Epic has wasted no time in harnessing that cash windfall and success, raising $1.25 billion from half a dozen investors in October 2018.

  The company is now fast expanding its Unreal Engine business into various sectors, offering free Online Services for developers, opening up a $100 million MegaGrants initiative and launching its own PC games storefront. It even has plans to open an Android games marketplace later this year.

  Epic Games was ranked first in PocketGamer.biz’s top 50 Developer list for 2018.

  The company also picked up two accolades for Game of the Year and Best Developer at the Pocket Gamer Mobile Games Awards 2019 in association with Game Insight.

  Epic Games Unreal Evangelist Christian Allen will be a speaker at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle, which takes place on May 13th to 14th.

  
  

• 11 FlowPlay

  

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2006
  Key staff: Derrick Morton (CEO), Douglas Pearson (CTO), Craig Robinson (CRO)
  Key Games: Vegas World
  Website: https://www.flowplay.com

  Something of a theme on this list, FlowPlay is another developer focusing its efforts on the social casino space - much like local companies Double Down Interactive and Big Fish Games.

  The firm’s flagship game is Vegas World, a free-to-play title with more than 45 casino-style games including slots, poker, blackjack, bingo, roulette, social sports betting and more. The title is played by millions of people around the world

  In 2017 FlowPlay transitioned its portfolio away from Flash and onto Haxe, fearing that thousands of Flash games might vanish once support for the tech ends in 2020.

  It’s also recently stepped into the blockchain space, partnering with Alto.io to leverage its tech for the development of a crypto-currency-based in-game monetisation platform for social games.

  Flowplay CRO Craig Robinson will be a speaker at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle, which takes place on May 13th to 14th.

  
  

• 12 Harebrained Schemes

  

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2011
  Key staff: Mitch Gitelman (President), Jordan Weisman (CEO)
  Key Games: Shadowrun Returns, BattleTech
  Website: http://harebrained-schemes.com

  Harebrained Schemes was formed in 2011 by Mitch Gitelman and Jordan Weisman, the creator of Shadowrun and Crimson Skies.

  In 2012, the company took to crowdfunding website Kickstarter to fun 3D turn-based RPG Shadowrun Returns, raising $1.8 million. Since then, the company’s portfolio has expanded to include more Shadowrun titles Dragonfall and Hong Kong, Golem Arcana, Necropolis and BattleTech.

  In 2018 the studio was acquired by publisher Paradox Interactive for $7.5 million.

  
  

• 13 Magic Leap

  

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2010
  Key staff: Rony Abovitz (CEO)
  Key product: Magic Leap One
  Website: https://www.magicleap.com

  Magic Leap considers itself a pioneer in the mixed reality space, and its all-star team has been able to convince investors of its potential by raising $2.3 billion to date across multiple funding rounds.

  After much anticipation it released the Magic Leap One Creator Edition headset in August 2018 with a price tag of $2,295, suggesting a consumer headset may be far away.

  Though its HQ is based in Florida, the company has opened a Seattle office. According to GeekWire, the office is helmed by famous science fiction author Neal Stephenson, with the branch home to the Self-Contained Existence Unit that focuses on researching the boundaries of what developers can build with Magic Leap’s MR tech.

  The VR/AR/MR sectors are set to continue growing over the coming years, and Magic Leap will be a key player in shaping how the market develops.

  
  

• 14 MetaArcade

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2016
  Key staff: David Reid (CEO)
  Key products: MetaArcade
  Website: https://www.metaarcade.com

  Launched in 2016, MetaArcade is the brainchild of former CCP CMO and Motiga SVP publishing David Reid.

  The company has built a platform, which dons the same name, that enables users to create and publish their own interactive fiction experiences for free for mobile devices.

  It’s designed creator tools so that anyone can create an interactive story complete with art, audio and RPG mechanics without the need for technical skills.

  Stories released on the platform to date include Cthulhu Chronicles and Tunnels & Trolls Adventures.

  
  

• 15 Microsoft

  

  Office: Redmond
  Headcount: 134,944 globally, 80,283 in the US
  Key staff: Phil Spencer (CVP Games), Matt Booty (Head of Xbox Game Studios), Bonnie Ross, (CVP of Xbox Game Studios)
  Key Games: Halo, Gears of War, Age of Empires
  Website: www.microsoft.com

  Software giant Microsoft had supported games for its Windows operating system for some time, but the firm jumped fully into the sector in 2000 with the launch of the Xbox.

  That first round of hardware was promising but didn't set the world on fire, with its 2005 follow-up the Xbox 360 going on to see massive success. That hasn't been true of 2013's Xbox One but the firm has been working tirelessly under the new leadership of Phil Spencer to turn the ship around.

  Today, Microsoft's games business is hardly recognisable as the company looks to a streaming and subscription future, is breaking down platform walls and - thanks to a considerable spending spree - has an impressive portfolio of developers to support it.

  Microsoft will be at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle on May 13th to 14th.

  
  

• 16 Mythical Games

  

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2000
  Key staff: John Linden (CEO), Jamie Jackson (CCO)
  Key Games: Blankos Block Party
  Website: https://mythical.games/

  Built up of industry veterans, Mythical Games recently formed as a next-generation technology company that specialises in blockchain gaming.

  Based in Los Angelos and Seattle, the studio is headed up by former Seismic Games president John Linden. The company raised $16 million last November from Series A funding with backers coming from a mixture of crypto-focused funds and traditional VCs.

  Mythical Games is currently working on its first blockchain title called Blankos Block Party, which is due to release in 2019.

  Long-term the firm wants to develop a platform that will enable game developers to create and deploy game items securely on the blockchain.

  Mythical Games CEO John Linden will be a speaker at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle, which takes place on May 13th to 14th.

  
  

• 17 Nintendo

  

  Office: Redmond
  Founded: 1982
  Key staff: Doug Bowser (president)
  Key Games: Super Mario, The Legend of Zelda, Pokemon
  Website: https://www.nintendo.com/

  Starting out as a hanafuda playing cards distributor, Nintendo has become one of the world’s largest video games companies with numerous well-known IP such as Super Mario, The Legend of Zelda, Pokemon and more.

  The company’s latest console is the Nintendo Switch, which sees users being able to take the tablet-like screen anywhere on the go or dock it at home to play on a large television.

  Nintendo of America has been at the forefront of the company's global strategy, as was now former NoA president and COO Reggie Fils-Aime. He is stepping down this month, with senior vice president of sales Doug Bowser taking on the role.

  Nintendo recently took its first steps into the world of VR through its toys-to-life product Labo. A new update was recently unveiled for Super Mario Odyssey and Breath of the Wild which will support VR.

  
  

• 18 Oculus

  

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2012
  Key staff: Hugo Barra (VP of VR), John Carmack (CTO)
  Key Products: Oculus Rift, Oculus Go, Oculus Quest
  Website: https://www.oculus.com

  Founded in 2012, Oculus quickly made headlines for promising to usher in a new era of virtual reality. It raised $2.4 million from a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign to develop the Rift headset.

  It was later picked up by Facebook for $3 billion and its product lineup now consists of the Oculus Rift, Quest and Go.

  The company's HQ is in California, but it has numerous offices across the country and worldwide - with one of those based right in Seattle.

  The branch currently has 44 jobs openings at the time of writing, with a few centred on a new area of interest for Oculus: augmented reality.

  The job listings disclose that the firm is interested in building its own AR hardware, on top of the range of VR headsets it already has on the market.

  Oculus parent company Facebook will have two speakers at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle, which takes place on May 13th to 14th.

  
  

• 19 PopCap Games

  

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2000
  Key staff: Matt Nutt (VP and portfolio GM, EA)
  Key Games: Plants Vs. Zombies series, Peggle series
  Website: https://www.ea.com/studios/popcap/

  PopCap was once known as one of the best casual games developers in the world. The company had hits with a roster of quirky games, from the Peggle series to the Plants Vs. Zombies franchise. Such was its success that it sold to EA for as much as $1.3 billion in 2011.

  It’s not quite yet been able to translate that success over to mobile, however. At the end of 2018 the company, along with EA, moved into new digs in downtown Seattle, housing around 100 PopCap staff and a further 100 EA employees, according to GeekWire.

  
  

• 20 Private Division

  Office: Seattle
  Headcount: 45 globally, seven in Seattle
  Key staff:  Michael Worosz (SVP and head of strategy and independent publishing), Allen Murray (VP of production)
  Key Games: The Outer World
  Website: www.privatedivision.com

  For years, Take-Two Interactive boss Strauss Zelnick had expressed an interest in the indie publishing sector but it wasn't until the end of 2017 that the Grand Theft Auto giant jumped into this part of the market.

  Private Division is the firm's new publishing label, focusing on mid-tier projects that sit between the small creativity and scope of indie titles and the big-budget triple-A releases.

  So far the company is working with the likes of Obsidian Entertainment and Panache Digital Games, and is handling Kerbal Space Program which Take-Two acquired back in 2017. It's early days, but this label is showing a lot of promise.

  Private Division will be at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle, which takes place on May 13th to 14th.

  
  

• 21 Spiderweb Software

  

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 1994
  Key staff: Jeff Vogel (President)
  Key Games: Exile, Geneforge and Avadon series
  Website: https://www.spiderwebsoftware.com/

  Jeff Vogel opened Seattle-based Spiderweb Software in 1994, with the company releasing story-based adventure games including Exile, Nethergate, Geneforge and Avadon.

  Demoware games are at the forefront of the studio, with releases on iOS, Android and Windows. Spiderweb’s story-telling games primarily focus on using retro-style graphics and turn-based combat.

  Last year Spiderweb held a Kickstarter for an all-new series/game called Queen’s Wish: The Conqueror. A new game engine was required as well as a new system, with 2,151 backers pledging $98,992 to see the project come to life.

  
  

• 22 Spry Fox

  

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2010
  Key staff: David Edery (CEO), Daniel Cook (CCO)
  Key Games: Alphabear, Triple Town, Road Not Taken
  Website: http://spryfox.com

  The popular developer SpryFox has an impressive portfolio that includes strategy puzzle game Triple Town, the Scrabble-inspired series Alphabear and roguelike puzzler Road Not Taken.

  The studio is headed up by chief creative officer Daniel Cook, who previously worked as a game designer at Microsoft, and CEO David Edery, also a former Microsoft alum where he held the role of worldwide games portfolio planner for Xbox Live Arcade.

  Edery will be a speaker at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle, which takes place on May 13th to 14th.

  
  

• 23 Stray Bombay

  Office: Seattle
  Headcount: Two
  Key staff: Chet Faliszek, Dr Kimberly Voll
  Key Games: N/A
  Website: www.straybombay.com

  Announced at GDC this year, Stray Bombay is a brand new venture from Valve and Bossa Studios vet Chet Faliszek and former Riot employee Dr Kimberly Voll.

  The duo are looking to use machine learning and Ai to make new and interesting co-operative game experiences that actually force people to work together.

  Right now the studio only employs a handful of people, but Faliszek and Voll want to grow the outfit to 20-to-30 staff to ship their first project.

  Stray Bombay's Chet Faliszek will be a speaker at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle, which takes place on May 13th to 14th.

• 24 Studio Wildcard

  

  Office: Bellevue
  Headcount: 60
  Key staff: Doug Kennedy (CEO), Jesse Rapczak (Co-founder)
  Key Games: Ark: Survival Evolved
  Website: www.studiowildcard.com

  Bellevue-based Studio Wildcard is best-known for its debut title Steam Early Access survival title Ark: Survival Evolved which has been a smash success and sold well over 5.5m copies since its launch.

  The outfit was founded by Microsoft vet Jesse Rapczak and Reverb Communications' Douglas Kennedy, Jeremy Stieglitz and Susan Stieglitz,

  The team is now moving on to its next game, Atlas, which was announced at The Game Awards 2018. Oh, and if that wasn't enough, the developer has set up a sister-studio called Grapeshot Games, to work on it. Not bad at all for five years!

  
  

• 25 Subset Games

  

  Office: Seattle
  Headcount: Two
  Key staff: Justin Ma and Matthew Davis
  Key Games: FTL: Faster Than Light, Into the Breach
  Website: www.subsetgames.com/

  Two-man indie outfit Subset Games was launched in 2011 by 2K vets Justin Ma and Matthew Davis, who wasted no time with their first project, FTL: Faster Than Light.

  A year of development went into this project before it hit Kickstarter, raising $200,000 in the process - 20 times the team's goal.

  FTL was wildly successful and hugely influential, with Subset continuing to bring new content in FTL: Advanced Edition.

  It wasn't until 2018 that the studio released a new game, Into the Breach, which launched to critical acclaim.

  
  

• 26 Sucker Punch

  

  Office: Bellevue
  Founded: 1997
  Headcount: 110
  Key staff: Brian Fleming (Co-founder), Chris Zimmerman (Co-founder), Bruce Oberg (Co-founder), Darrell Plank (Co-founder), Tom Saxton (Co-founder), Cathy Saxton (Co-founder)
  Key Games: Sly Cooper, Infamous, Ghosts of Tsushima
  Website: https://www.suckerpunch.com/

  Founded in 1997, all of Sucker Punch's six co-founders previously worked for Microsoft in some capacity before leaving their roles to establish the studio.

  Sucker Punch’s first project was Rocket: Robot on Wheels for the N64 before the firm started to make games exclusively for PlayStation consoles. In August 2011, Sucker Punch was acquired by Sony Interactive Entertainment.

  Properties developed by Sucker Punch include the Sly Cooper trilogy, Infamous series and the upcoming action-adventure Ghosts of Tsushima. This will be the studio’s first game release in five years.

  
  

• 27 tinyBuild Games

  

  Office: Bothell
  Founded: 2011
  Headcount: c. 20
  Key staff: Alex Nichiporchik (CEO)
  Key Games: Hello Neighbour, Mr. Shifty, Streets of Rogue
  Website: https://www.tinybuild.com/

  After successfully raising $26,000 in a Kickstarter, TinyBuild was flying high. However, after a turbulent time with a Russian developer backing out of funding, the company has had to go the long way around to get its games out the door.

  No Time to Explain was the first game launched, as well as being CEO Alex Nichiporchik’s whole reason for getting into games in the first place. Since then TinyBuild has become a publisher released popular games such as Hello Neighbour, Mr. Shifty and Streets of Rogue.

  The company recently secured $15 million in a Series-A funding round. With this, the company plans to expand both of its Seattle and Amsterdam offices.

  
  

• 28 Twitch Interactive

  

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2011
  Headcount: c. 1,000-plus
  Key staff: Emmett Shear (CEO)
  Key Product: Twitch
  Website: https://www.twitch.tv/

  Livestreaming platform Twitch is hard to avoid these days. After launching in June 2011 as a side-project to Justin.tv, the company was bought by Amazon in 2014 for $970 million and has gone onto become a major part of games culture.

  As well as more typical game streams, the service has been a platform for good causes such as for charity Games Done Quick, which has brought in nearly $20 million in donations.

  It hasn’t been all good news however, as the site was banned in China after a surge in activity from users watching esports coverage of the 2018 Asian Game.

  Twitch accumulated more than 9.36 billion hours of watched content in 2018.

• 29 Undead Labs

  Office: Seattle
  Founded: 2009
  Headcount: c. 60
  Key staff: Jeff Strain (Studio head)
  Key Games: State of Decay series
  Website: https://undeadlabs.com/

  Undead Labs was founded in 2009 by Jeff Strain. The studio partnered with Microsoft throughout the Xbox 360 and Xbox One era, going on to release State of Decay and its sequel exclusively for the consoles. Both titles later came to Windows as part of Microsoft’s play anywhere initiative.

  Strain was originally part of the trio who co-founded ArenaNet before leaving to start Undead Labs, with the studio’s headquarters located in Seattle, Washington.

  At Microsoft’s 2018 E3 press conference, it was revealed that Microsoft had acquired Undead Labs, promising the studio would continue working on zombie games.

  Microsoft will be at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle on May 13th to 14th.

  
  

• 30 Valve

  

  Office: Bellevue
  Headcount: Over 360
  Key staff: Gabe Newell (CEO)
  Key Games: Half-life, Portal, Left 4 Dead, DOTA 2, Artifact
  Website: www,valvesoftware.com/

  Founded back in 1996 by Microsoft vets Gabe Newell and Mike Harrington as a game developer, Valve has gone on to define the PC games market in the last decade.

  The company has gone from making games to focusing on selling them via its Steam platform, with over 150 million accounts registered with the storefront.

  The firm has even dipped its toes into hardware, launching the Vive VR headset with HTC and teasing its own Index headset at the moment.

  During this time the company drifted away from games development following the 2013 launch of DOTA 2, but the firm says it is making games again with the launch of spin-off card game Artifact.

  That hasn't gone 100 per cent to plan but the Bellevue-based firm is looking to right the ship and is still working on other projects behind the scenes.

  Valve will be at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle, which takes place on May 13th to 14th.

  
  

• 31 WildTangent

  

  Office: Redmond
  Founded: 1998
  Headcount: c. 200
  Key staff: Matt Shea (CEO)
  Key Products: WildTangent game network, Fate series
  Website: https://www.wildtangent.co.uk/

  Based in Redmond, Washington, WildTangent is a PC games service provider that has its own games studio. The company started in 1998 and has a catalogue of over 4,000 games from third-party developers. WildTangent’s own game studios have released over 30 titles.

  In 2011 the firm partnered with T-Mobile to launch an Android games service. WildTangent’s portfolio of games is vast but it is also known for the studio's popular action RPG Fate series.

  German free-to-play publisher Gamigo acquired the casual games outfit in April 2019.

• 32 Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle 2019

  You can meet a plethora of local and international studios, including some of those profiled on this list, at Pocket Gamer Connects Seattle 2019 on May 13th to 14th.

  More than 125 expert speakers will address the hottest topics and latest trends across mobile games, handheld consoles, and VR and AR. You can check out some of the amazing speakers here and here.

  There’s more than mobile

  Partner event, PC Connects, lands Stateside for the first time in Seattle, with a further four unmissable tracks for any PC games professional.

  Alongside the Very Big Indie Pitch for mobile developers where entrants hope to impress the judges and win prizes worth thousands of dollars, there’s also a dedicated PC Indie Pitch.

  Blockchain Gaming stars as one of the featured tracks on day two, which will feature how to implement blockchain into your game, the impact of cryptocurrency and opportunities it offers developers in the future.

  Your ticket will get you into both shows and all 13 conference tracks.

  Party, networking, business! Not necessarily in that order...

  No other event puts you in touch with the entire mobile gaming industry like Pocket Gamer Connects. From our online Pitch & Match meeting scheduler - free to all delegates - to the SpeedMatch sessions that pair developers with publishers in a series of speed-dating style meetings, Pocket Gamer Connects helps you make the connections that are crucial for your business.

  New for 2019, Investor Connector pairs selected professionals looking for funding with interested investors active in the sector for pre-qualified one-on-one meetings.

  Of course, it wouldn't be a Pocket Gamer Connects without our Global Connects Party on the first night. Whether you’re there for the free bar, finger food, music and dancing the night away or to carry on networking into the night, the party itself is worth the price of admission.

  Want to head to PGC Seattle? Book now!