23-Old British Studio Blitz Games Closes its Doors

Founded by the legendary Oliver Twins, the studio was today forced to wind-down operations after more than 23 years in the British games industry.

If you’re not familiar with Blitz Games Studios’ recent output, you might instead recognise their Dizzy game series. A popular mascot in the 1980’s, he starred in a number of tough-as-nails platformer/adventure-game hybrids released for the Atari ST, Spectrum, Commodore 64 and Amiga platforms, among others.

The Oliver Twins attempted to revive the Dizzy series late last year with its Dizzy Returns Kickstarter, but the project fell massively short of its £350,000 target, with only £25,620 pledged.

As a result of the closure, 175 staff members will lose their positions at Blitz Games Studios, though 50 jobs will be safeguarded as a new company is formed to service current clients.

In more positive news, Oxford-based developer Rebellion, who most recently found success with the Sniper Elite series, is looking to hire the remaining staff from Blitz Games. Philip Oliver said:

“We’d like to publicly thank Chris and Jason Kingsley from Rebellion for their support and friendship during this time – they are acting incredibly honourably and helping us to find new roles for as many of our staff as possible. They began their careers in games at around the same time we did and epitomise the positive and supportive culture of long-standing game developers in the UK.”