Wargaming, the developers of World of Tanks, have acquired Edge Case. This is the studio behind a dead SF-MMO, behind Fractured Space. Development there was halted in October. Now the team is working on a new MMO for Wargaming.
This has happened: Wargaming has pampered itself with the studio “Edge Case”. The 32 employees of the MMO studio in Guildford, England, are moving to the Wargaming UK studio. This is – what a coincidence – also in Guildford, a town with 80,000 inhabitants.
The new studio in the same city was opened by Wargaming just a few months earlier, in September 2018.
At that time, Wargaming had already said: The UK has a fantastic talent pool of employees, especially in Guildford. Apparently, Wargaming had already considered the “Edge Case” studio back in September.
A new MMO is being created in the UK
What are they working on in Guildford? The now 55 employees of Wargaming UK will be working on a new, yet-to-be-announced MMO. It is supposed to be a Free2Play MMO and run on the Unreal Engine. However, more is not yet known.
What Edge Case has done so far: Edge Case developed the SF-MMO “Fractured Space”. However, it essentially ended in October 2018.
At that time, Edge Case announced that no new updates for Fractured Space would be released. However, the game will remain online.
Fractured Space: Good ratings, few players
How it went with Fractured Space:
- On Steamcharts, it can be seen that Fractured Space never really managed to find a player base. Fractured Space peaked in the fall of 2016 with an average of 1000 players. However, in 2017, the game mostly had between 200 and 300 people online. Since 2018, the player numbers have further declined.
- Meanwhile, Fractured Space has excellent ratings on Steam and holds 77% positive reviews.
This is what Wargaming says: Wargaming states that the acquisition of Edge Case significantly accelerates its plans for the new MMO. Originally, the plan was to expand its own studio to only 25 people. They were supposed to develop the concept for the new game.
Now, with 55 employees, it will go significantly faster.
What’s behind it: Apparently, Wargaming had planned to acquire the Guildford studio months ago. It is said that “they have been looking for ways to collaborate with Edge Case for years. After all, both companies develop free vehicle-based MMOs.”
Sounds like the next MMO from Wargaming will again be a “vehicle-based MMO”, but maybe in space.
