Bethesda Establishes New Studio in Austin, TX

Great news for budding game developers in Texas—Bethesda has opened a new studio in Austin, TX, USA. The studio is called Battlecry Studios and, perhaps most interestingly, will be headed up by former BioWare industry vet Rich Vogel. Vogel was the executive producer on Star Wars: The Old Republic, likely being chosen for his experience with MMOs like Ultima Online and Star Wars Galaxies. The studio is hiring "other experienced game developers to fill key roles for an unannounced project."

“We are very pleased to have someone with Rich’s vast experience join us at Bethesda,” said Vlatko Andonov, President of Bethesda Softworks. “Rich has a history of building and managing talented development teams and bringing high quality games to market, and we look forward to working with him on a new exciting project.”

It seems safe to guess that this project may have to do with MMOs or online multiplayer, with a guy like Vogel heading it up. But the MMO space has proven to be a scary place to try and make it indeed, with famous game analyst Michael Pachter even once stating that MMOs are dead due to Star Wars: The Old Republic's failure. Bethesda Softworks has only had success recently though, with The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim getting great reviews and Dishonored recently going gold. Perhaps they hope to try and revive the genre, or perhaps try their hand at a free-to-play game? Time will only tell.

Either way, the new studio is now a part of ZeniMax Media, a privately owned media organization that also owns Bethesda Softwares. Arkane Studios is another ZeniMax-owned developer in the city, which is better known as the studio that developed Dishonored.

“I have always admired and respected Bethesda’s approach to making great, original games,” said Vogel. “It’s a belief and passion I share, and I’m looking forward to building a team of high quality developers who want to bring that same commitment and creative energy to the games we’ll be creating.”