Today we are excited to announce that the Undead Labs Studio Head and Founder, Jeff Strain, is launching an exciting new initiative. As anyone who has played State of Decay knows, big ideas don’t always come from the biggest cities or the flashiest neighborhoods. Sometimes the heroes come from places like Marshall or Spencer’s Mill. That’s why game development needs a bigger base, where the know-how, grit, and ideas of even more people can find their way to the public. As a small town guy himself, Jeff is dedicated to opening a new studio and a partnered broad-discipline game development academy in New Orleans, Louisiana. With the support of Xbox and Microsoft, Jeff’s going to continue in his role as studio head at Undead Labs while also building opportunities to bring in people who might not otherwise consider a career in the game industry. Maybe even someone with the vision for the next State of Decay is out there just waiting for the right opportunity! That’s all we can say for now, but we’ll share more information as soon as we can.
game development
A message for our friends at ArenaNet
To our friends, former co-workers, and industry colleagues at ArenaNet:
We are profoundly saddened to hear the news of the layoffs today. We feel a special kinship with ArenaNet given our shared DNA and our shared history of working together. We can only imagine what you are going through and would like to extend our heartfelt support. Indeed, news like this takes its toll on the entire industry, and taken together with the recent layoffs at Activision/Blizzard and the closure of the former Z2 studio in Seattle, we are distressed by the destruction of trust and safety that creative enterprises require to thrive.
As such, we would like to do everything we can to help people find their next great opportunity. We invite all ArenaNet staff to join us for an open house at Undead Labs on Wednesday evening, February 27th, from 4:00 to 7:00 pm. We’ll do our best to coordinate with the entire Xbox Game Studios family to ensure we have broad representation of opportunity within all of our studios. We’ll be ready to share more about our open positions, our product plans, and our development culture with you. Dinner and parking on us. Please RSVP by letting a friend here at the Lab know you plan to attend, or send an email to: rsvp@undeadlabs.com