British B-Boy Developer Expands

Representatives for British developer FreeStyleGames have announced that the company is to undergo major expansion, including a move to bespoke offices and plans to significantly grow its development capacity. Based in Leamington Spa, in the Midlands of England, the company’s first title is hip-hop rhythm action game B-Boy for the PSP and PlayStation 2 – to be published by Sony Computer Entertainment Europe (SCEE) this month. The studio currently employs over thirty staff, but is looking to recruit new artists, animators, programmers and project managers over the next nine to twelve months. Chris Lee, commercial director commented, "It's an exciting time for the company, not only have we been able to design and develop our own environment from the ground-up, but we have created the capacity to house more staff and establish multiple teams. This growth will allow us to build on our progress on next generation, as well as continuing to support the PS2 and PSP. While we're all excited about the results we're seeing on next-gen hardware, we're still committed to developing at least two more current generation products, as there's a lot of life left in the market so it doesn't make sense to ignore it." Lee continued, "It's easy to jump to the next generation too soon – with multiple teams we can continue making fun, innovative games, while investing the time required to ensure a strong tool and engine for our new next gen IP."