Virtuos opens a new studio in Warsaw, Poland

Game development company Virtuos has confirmed that it will be opening a new studio based in Warsaw, Poland, as a branch of Virtuos Labs.

The details:

• Virtuos announced the studio's opening in a new blog post as part of the Virtuos Labs network, which now includes three studios in Lyon, Montpellier, and Warsaw. The graphics team will be led by rendering lead Peter Sikacheve, who has 12 years of experience in graphics programming and has previously worked on games such as Cyberpunk 2077 and Shadow of the Tomb Raider for CD Projekt Red and Eidos Montreal.
• The other two Virtuos Labs locations in Lyon and Montpellier, respectively, focus on proprietary game engine development and R&D, with the three locations allowing for "better synergy" between the company's clients and studios in Europe, as each location is regarded as an industry development hub.
• By the end of the year, the company hopes to have a new team of 35 people, mostly engineers, working on AAA projects in Unreal Engine and other proprietary game engines with its partners. There are currently a few job openings at the new location, mostly for artists and programmers, with the majority of them being intermediate to senior positions. The job postings can be found on Virtuos' careers website here.
• Virtuos is well-known for its AAA game ports and remasters, such as Final Fantasy X and XCOM, as well as its work as an external support studio for Guerrilla's Horizon titles. Its port of NieR:Automata to the Nintendo Switch was dubbed a "miracle port" due to its consistent 30 FPS, despite the game's visual quality remaining relatively unchanged.

More studio openings in 2023:

• Paul Ehreth, Control's former lead designer, has founded Anchor Point, a new NetEase studio. There are no details regarding the studio’s debut project; however, the studio is said to be "dedicated to developing action-adventure games for console and PC that push the boundaries of entertainment and bring elements of surprise into the gameplay.”
• Popularium is a new studio founded by industry veterans responsible for the card games Hearthstone and Magic: The Gathering, as well as World of Warcraft. The company's first game, Chaos Agents, has been described as an "auto battle royale," with more details to follow.
• Magic Soup Games is a new studio founded by former Blizzard employees Jen Oneal, John Donham, and J. Allen Brack. The studio intends to create "massive AAA games with positive themes," though no specifics have been released so far.