Forza Horizon developer Playground Games opens second studio to develop open world, non-racing game

Forza Horizon developer Playground Games is opening a second development studio to work on an open world, non-racing title.

Playground Games is currently seeking premieses for the studio, “ideally within walking distance” of its current headquarters in Leamington Spa.

Speaking to GamesIndustry.biz, Playground Games founder and creative director Ralph Fulton said the new studio is “a great opportunity for us to test ourselves in a different genre.” Fulton anticipates “we’re going to need to hire some very talented people with experience that we don’t have.”

Playground Games is currently staffed with 115 people and plans to grow to around 200. The independent studio opened in 2010 and has currently only developed Forza Horizon titles. The new studio will mark its first foray into another genre, as well as the first time it focuses on more than one project at once.

Fulton said that the new project will have “an entirely new leadership team,” which they’re in the process of hiring, and that “nothing on the two projects depends on one person, because both of the teams should be thinking about their own project.”

Meanwhile, Forza Horizon“remains the cornerstone of our business,” according to Fulton. “We’re not running away from racing, we still feel passionate about making new racing games and delivering new experiences for our players.”

Fulton continued, “Horizon 3 was a watershed game for us – it’s certainly our best-reviewed game critically, it’s our most commercially successful game as well. It’s the first time we’ve experienced that commercial breakout hit phenomenon – the other games have been successful but not on the level of this one. We want to keep doing that. In a way, that game took six years to make. So we want to keep developing that skillset and pushing new boundaries.”