Third Signal has announced that Black Forest Games is spinning out of THQ Nordic through a management buyout, and co-founding the new independent group of game studios as its first member. The Offenburg studio, part of THQ Nordic and Embracer Group since 2017, will continue to develop and publish games under its own label. THQ Nordic and Black Forest Games will also keep collaborating on game development.
Xbox players will know the studio from the Destroy All Humans! remake and Destroy All Humans! 2 – Reprobed, both still on the Xbox Store and published by THQ Nordic. Its other credits include Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams, Fade to Silence and Rogue Stormers. Those games remain available, so nobody needs to hide the saucer just yet, and the two companies say they will keep working together.
Andreas Tobler, founder and CEO of Third Signal, said some of the best games of the last decade came from teams of fifty, not five hundred, and called Black Forest Games “the right studio to launch Third Signal.” The group’s aim is to be developer-driven, giving teams “the independence, resources and creative freedom to continue their creative legacy and bring their own ideas to life.”
“We are grateful to THQ Nordic and Embracer for nine good years and the games we made together. Now, we’re excited to shape our own future as owners again, to work on an exciting new project with a great team and strong partners behind us,” said Adrian Goersch. Andreas Speer added: “There are lots of opportunities for lean, experienced teams, and we will use them.” Goersch and Speer are both CEOs of Black Forest Games and co-founders of Third Signal Studios. The new project has not been named.
Third Signal describes itself as a new independent group making premium games for PC and console, co-owned by Third Signal Ventures and the Black Forest Games management team. The studio was founded in 2012 and is based in Offenburg, Germany. The news arrives on the same day as Embracer’s latest quarterly results.
