2023 was a hell of a ride! Along the way, we faced many pitfalls and crossroads that required us to make the right decisions. It was certainly a productive year, the work of our specialists saw the light of day with major launches that you have surely heard about! What happened in our company during the year? A bit of statistics from our HR department. We currently have 154 specialists on board, in 2023 we hired 52 people.
The (somewhat belated) celebration of Anshar Studios’ 10th anniversary is where we need to start. Even though we are already closer to our 12th year, the past edition of Digital Dragons conference in Kraków was an opportunity to celebrate the studio’s round anniversary. Together with a very sizable representation (there were more than 60 of us at DD!), we reminisced about the projects that Anshar Studios has had the opportunity to create over the years. I mean, do you still remember Kate Malone or The Path of Kara?! Those are just classics! By the way, Anshark was born and scolded everyone’s hearts. Beware, because at the next event it will take to the waters again!
Layers of Fear Launch. The project co-produced with Bloober Team is further proof that we can do remasters. Bold statement. However, the stakes were a bit higher, as the latest Layers of Fear is a merge of two games along with additional content that functioned as the glue of the whole story. The DLC, titled “The Final Note,” showed a new perspective on the storyline that fans of the Bloober Team series have come to know over the years. Our team was primarily involved in art remastering, gameplay improvements, porting the game to current-generation consoles and creating new content. In addition to a brand-new level (we won’t spoil too much here), the DLC “The Final Prologue” also came out from under the wings of Anshar Studios, in which the player played the role of a horror film director. I don’t think we need to persuade you to play, do we? By the way, we send Christmas greetings to the Bloober Team!
Specialists from Anshar Studios also had the opportunity to support the development process of Gord. Specifically, we focused on supporting gameplay programming. The single-player, adventure-strategy game, developed by Convenant, premiered in Q3 of this year, and we’re still keeping our fingers crossed for Gord to reach a wider audience – it’s due!
As you may know, we’ve been working on an unannounced title on behalf of a client for some time. The massive one, a cool co-op first-person shooter and… you’ll definitely be hearing more soon. At this point, we would just like to mention that currently the project team surpasses 90 (!) people, also the majority of Anshar Studio peers are working to make this project find its place in players’ libraries. This is a full-SKU development. Mark our words, definitely worth waiting!
Is it finally time to make that? Do we send greetings to Belgium now? Sure, let’s go! The Larian Studios team has delivered, and delivered sternly. Baldur’s Gate 3 has swirled the RPG world. 96 Metacritic score speaks for themselves. And we can only rejoice that Anshar Studios employees were able to support the Belgian team with tools, gameplay and UI programming.
We are working on several EU projects. You can find full details in the EU Projects tab on our website.
And what’s up with our publisher from across the building? Anshar Publishing is currently working vigorously on an isometric RPG with turn-based combat. Zoria: Age of Shattering will debut on PC on March 7, 2024. We encourage you to Wishlist!
Meanwhile, 2023 was the time for Anshar Publishing to convert the release of Gamedec – Definitive Edition, which debuted in late 2022. Due to the game’s appearance in the Free Week promotion at Epic Games Store and numerous Bundles, supported by other RPGs, Gamedec reached 5 million players! The number is impressive, isn’t it? Remember, however, that this is the number of people who have the game in their library.
#Gamedec reached a new milestone!
We are thrilled to see that @GamedecTheGame has 5+ million owners across all platforms!
From the bottom of our hearts, we want to extend a massive THANK YOU to each and every one of you who has stepped into the boots of our in-game detectives! pic.twitter.com/jb0uXn5Q72
— AnsharPublishing (@AnsharPublish) November 10, 2023
Liberte – a roguelite deck-builder, inspired by the French Revolution and body horror, fly away from the Early Access phase in May 2023. Liberte is available on the most popular PC stores, and we strongly encourage you to make some runs on the street of Paris! btw. Watch out for the weird creatures.
Just at the end of the year, another great RPG has been added to our collection – Coridden. What’s Coridden, you ask? Picture an action-packed Hack and Slash game with a pulse-pounding co-op and dinosaurs. 🦖 (RAWR!, hehe 😉). But here’s the best news yet – a Kickstarter campaign starts soon!
The time for recapitulation has come to an end, and we are already looking ahead to the upcoming challenges. Let’s be honest, 2024 will certainly be a year of some difficulties’ and bumps, which will face not only our team, but the entire game development industry. To everyone – We can do it! See you next year!
