Starform, a Seattle-based game development studio founded by former King developers, has raised an additional $5 million to fund the development and marketing of its upcoming release, and scale up the team for future projects.

The funding round was led by Bitkraft Ventures, with participation from Global Founders Capital, VGames, and Dune Ventures, and brings the studio's lifetime raised to $6.6 million.

This latest funding comes as that aforementioned, unannounced game readies to leave closed beta and reach the wider public later this year. While details on the title itself are slim, the Starform team notes that its goal as a studio is to create games that bring players together to explore, create, compete, and achieve together.

The studio itself was founded in 2018 by the former leaders of Z2, a mobile game studio acquired by King for $45 million in 2015 before being shuttered in 2019. That previous acquisition, according to a press release, helped build investor faith in Starform's leadership team ahead of this latest funding round.

“We are excited to partner with a skilled second-time founder team, with their former studio being acquired for $45 million by King," reads a statement from Bitkraft founding general partner Malte Barth. "Starform has a very unique and strong culture that centers around building games that deeply resonate with the community."