After a good 23 years as a solo-studio developer, French dev Quantic Dream has opened a second studio across the Atlantic in Montreal.
Quantic Dream Montreal is to be led by general manager Stéphane D’Astous, a veteran of Canadian studios like Edios-Montreal, Ubisoft Montreal, and, recently, a number of smaller developers.
Despite the two locations, D'Astous notes in a blog post that both Quantic Dream Paris and Quantic Dream Montreal will work together on the same projects with Montreal tackling specifically "game mechanics and all the gameplay."
The new offshoot is only opening its doors in a metaphoric sense while the pandemic keeps many companies working remotely, but the company notes in a blog post that they're still looking to hire North American talent to staff up the new office.
A separate chat with Quantic Dream CEO David Cage over on IGN also addresses an important subject: studio culture. Quantic Dream came under fire for fostering a toxic workplace after an former employee's wrongful termination case brought “homophobic, misogynistic, racist, or deeply vulgar,” acts to light, as stated by a judge in 2019.
Cage's comments on the subject of fostering a healthy workplace for its new studio are captured in their entirety in the full IGN story here, but in short Cage denies those earlier toxicity claims and tells the publication that harassment trainings for both studios' management teams, a local HR department, and anonymous reporting tools are in place all aim to ensure staff are treated fairly.