Posted in: Games, Video Games | Tagged: Wargaming, Wargaming Seattle, World Of Tanks

Wargaming Seattle, previously Gas Powered Games, is Shutting Down

Published Wed, 23 May 2018 16:35:06 -0500

Reports are slowly making their way around the internet today that Wargaming Seattle, formerly Gas Powered Games, will be shutting down in two months. The studio was originally opened in 1998 by Chris Taylor but was bought out by the World of Tanks publisher Wargaming back in 2013. Wargaming CEO Victor Kislyi was the one to make the official announcement today to staff.

According to Gamasutra's report:

Word is spreading today that Wargaming Seattle is shutting down, potentially eliminating over a hundred jobs.

This is a big deal given that Wargaming Seattle is the Redmond-based studio formerly known as Gas Powered Games, which was founded in 1998 by Chris Taylor and other former Cavedog devs.

During its lifetime Gas Powered became known for series like Dungeon Siege and Supreme Commander(as well as the early DotA-alike Demigod), but after a failed Kickstarter campaign the ailing studio was acquired by Wargaming in 2013.

Taylor wound up leaving the studio in 2016, and now (according to at least one former dev) the studio itself is reportedly closed.

Now, Wargaming itself will continue on, but the Seattle branch is closing down, which is certainly sad news. The reports are mostly coming from the twitter accounts of developers, with no official word on why the studio is closing. Its worth noting that the official Twitter account for the studio has been quiet since November 2017. That said, the #WGJobs tag is ripe with recruiters looking to pick up the displaced devs, so at least that's something.

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