While the development side of things will continue separately as before, Image & Form’s successful self-publishing team will take care of PR/marketing/publishing for both studios.
Zoink’s CEO Klaus Lyngeled is very positive. “Zoink has created many successful IPs and creative games for others, but we’ve always worked through other publishers. Now it’s time to take ownership of our coming titles and sell directly to our customers. The collaboration with Image & Form means we can lift the studio to new levels.”
Zoink’s latest game, Stick It to The Man!, has been released to a multitude of platforms, and has been downloaded more than 1.3 million times - splendid figures for a non-mobile game. The studio has worked with leading players such as Google, Cartoon Network and Disney, and will continue to do so. “But naturally we want to focus on our own ideas, and now we can focus on them. My vision for Zoink has always been to create an incredibly creative studio,” says Klaus Lyngeled.
One of the key people behind the joint effort is the CEO of Image & Form, Brjann Sigurgeirsson. With the worldwide multi-platform indie hit SteamWorld Dig, Image & Form has established itself as a self-publishing game studio. “We’ve been virtually unknown to the game audience, but now we’ve been able to develop and market bigger, deeper games. I look forward to working with Zoink and push their wonderful games as well. Together, we’ll be a real powerhouse - two great studios with separate visions and common goals.”
This setup - a joint publishing effort by two or more studios - has been tried before, most notably by Gathering of Developers around the turn of the century. “By keeping it local and small, we won’t have to become a publisher that spreads too thin,” Brjann Sigurgeirsson muses. “We’ll have time and resources to focus on every release from both studios.”
Modern marketplaces such as Steam, PlayStation Store, Nintendo eShop and the App Store have enabled also smaller developers to publish their games themselves, something that has appealed to Klaus Lyngeled at Zoink for a long time. “Earlier we’ve worked dedicated publishers in order to minimize the economic risks of every release. While safe, this also means that we’ve had to give up IP rights, revenue shares and means to influence marketing efforts,” he says. “Our new sister studio Image & Form have self-published for a good while now, and they’re doing a great job at it. We’ll work closely with them so that more people find and play our games.”