Codemasters Acquire the Staff and Brand Name of Evolution Studios

Just a few weeks after the announcement of the sad closure of Evolution Studios by Sony, we have some much more pleasant news regarding the Cheshire-based development studio. The studio staff, premises and name have been acquired by Codemasters, and their expertise will be utilised in the veteran publisher's stable of racing games.

The IP for the Motorstorm and Driveclub franchises remain with Sony, so the future of those game series is still sadly doubtful but the promise of future games from Evolution is now alive and well. Whilst they will be an in-house development team for Codemasters, their games will, for the time being at least, retain the Evolution brand.

This also paves the way for titles to appear cross-platform. In a statement on their website, Codemasters were keen to point out that Evolution's games are no longer tied exclusively to Sony's consoles, but will appear on various platforms as Codemasters' other games currently do. 

Frank Sagnier, Codemasters' CEO was delighted by the news:

“The success of F1™ 2015 and DiRT Rally over the last 12 months has re-positioned the company for growth. The addition of the Evolution team to our studio group will allow us to scale our business and strengthen our leadership as the world’s premier racing game developer. I’m thrilled to have Mick Hocking [former Evolution co-founder] join Codemasters as VP of Product Development. His experience in building AAA IP and leading great teams made him a natural choice to head the development of all of our products. I am equally thrilled to welcome his talented team to the Codemasters family and I look forward to the great games and brand new IP we will develop together.”