We Are Opening a Game Studio in North America to Make Games You Might Not Expect From Us

by Ryan Wener, NA Studio GM

On behalf of Supercell, I am excited to announce that we are setting up a new game development studio in North America.

It all starts with a question. What games could we make, if we combined:

• The best development talent in North America, long-recognized for crafting great, deep gameplay experiences for PC and consoles.

• Supercell’s culture of independent teams and approach to making great games played by the biggest audiences for years and years.

If you’re an ambitious founder-type game developer who wants to try to answer that question together with us and to make amazing games played around the world, then we should talk. I’ll try to explain what we think we can make, why you should do this here, and who we’re looking for to join us.

Games You Might Not Expect From Supercell

Over the past 10+ years, with great teams and some luck, Supercell has developed some of the most played and beloved mobile games: Clash of Clans, Clash Royale, Brawl Stars, Hay Day, and Boom Beach. We are really proud of our teams’ achievements so far, including:

• Players have downloaded our games over 5 billion times

• More than 250 million players play our games every month

• Clash of Clans and Hay Day will celebrate their 10th anniversaries in 2022 and are still enjoyed by many millions of players every day

• Each of our 5 games has earned over $1B in revenue

• Clash of Clans and Clash Royale have combined to earn over $10B in revenue

As fortunate as we have been, we’re never done. We are establishing this new team to pursue a specific goal: assemble and enable the best talent in North America to create what’s next across any platform, not just mobile. We want to build ambitious games players may not expect from Supercell.

If you dream of reimagining a deep game experience for the widest possible audience around the globe, then this could be the right opportunity. If you have a game idea in the back of your mind, reinventing your favorite gameplay to make something entirely new, then we should talk.

Freedom to Focus on Making Great Games

While talking about this new studio with top developers, often their first question is what Supercell’s structure looks like or how development decisions are made. I think what’s behind these questions is creative freedom or independence.

I love these questions because the core idea behind Supercell is independent game teams that have complete ownership of what they build and how they build it. Developers at other companies might be accustomed to control mechanisms, greenlight processes, and executive oversight. We believe that mechanisms like these take ownership away from development teams, slow them down, and get in the way of creativity, resulting in worse games. So we just don’t work that way.

Does the team have an idea for a unique gameplay or progression system? Try it. You can learn from other Supercell teams, but you don’t have to repeat what they have done. Want to create a new IP? Fantastic. Want to build a new game using Clash or Brawl Stars IP? Also fantastic. If the team is truly ambitious, have at it. We trust independent teams to try new ideas, build them out, and let players tell us what’s great.

On top of your team’s creative independence, by starting a new team & studio at Supercell you can:

• Make games millions of players will know about, via our massive, global reach

• Build a team & studio from scratch, without the distractions of starting a new company and everything that comes with doing that

• Get support & insights (as much or as little as you need) from the best mobile game creators at Supercell

Core Founding Team

We believe the best teams make the best games. So we aim to form a core founding team, who will work really well together and complement each other, around which to build the development team. Of course, there are different ways of assembling this core founding team:

• We could hire an existing duo, trio, or team. If you and one or more current or former teammates want to start this together, that’s awesome. Let’s talk as a unit.

• We could hire that first founder who knows the team to assemble. If you want to come build this, and you know the developers you’d want to bring next, excellent. Let’s get started together, then bring them aboard.

The key point here is that a core team – rather than any single individual – will be the kernel of this studio. We know each member of this core founding team will bring a unique skillset like programming, art, or game design. At this point, there’s just one question: are you a “founder?”

We are seeking ambitious founders who can form a team from scratch, who have game ideas they’ve been dying to develop, and who will treat this team like a startup within Supercell.

Opportunity to Build a Representative Team

Starting a new team and studio is a unique opportunity in the gaming industry to push for greater representation and inclusion in game development.

When we talk about making games for the biggest possible audiences, we mean games that are enjoyed by players from all kinds of backgrounds, all over the world. We should strive for our development teams – including this new one – to have this same level of representation and inclusion.

Flexible Location

2020 and 2021 showed us that great work can happen in different ways and locations. We are establishing this studio from day 1 to be flexible in terms of locale. We’re open-minded about ways to approach this, from co-locating in San Francisco (Supercell’s US office location since 2011) or elsewhere in North America, to building this team for remote work. Or some hybrid/combination could work, too.

More Info to Come

We have been having great discussions with developers, who want to build something amazing alongside the best colleagues, and we look forward to having more. When we have the core founding team in place, we’ll share more news then. Can’t wait. (And happy holidays!)

— Ryan Wener, NA Studio GM
(NAstudio@supercell.com)