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Aaryn Flynn’s Inflexion studio is now owned by Tencent
Inflexion Games is a studio made up of former BioWare developers, including former BioWare general manager Aaryn Flynn, now part of Tencent. The Chinese conglomerate’s acquisition of the studio was announced by UK-based tech firm Improbable, Inflexion’s original parent company, which said its sale of the studio was its new strategy for “Metaverse Events” part of the focus.
“While we are focused on accelerating the metaverse, we want to ensure that games developed by our in-house studios benefit from the support of publishers who have a leading track record in bringing games to market,” Improbable CEO Herman Narula Say. “As a result, we cannot expect to find a better partner than Tencent for Inflexion Games and Nightingale.”
“It’s an honor to work with the Tencent family,” Flynn said. “The deep knowledge and expertise provided by Tencent’s global team, as well as their empowerment of our team’s independence and innovative spirit, provide valuable opportunities for collaboration.”
Flynn told game industry Tencent’s acquisition of Inflexion, established in 2019 as Improbable Edmonton, has been in the works since the summer of 2021. He said Tencent has so far “greatly respected” Inflexion’s design direction in making the survival game Nightingale in the new Victorian fantasy world announced in December 2021.
“We recognize that they are not only the largest game development company in the world, but a company that has extensive experience in creating engaging live services and engaging player communities, and understands exactly the culture needed to build these,” he said. “As this is an important part of our business plan with Nightingale, we are excited about this complementary expertise.”
It’s official! @InflexionGames is now part of the Tencent studio and developer community. I’m excited to continue working on @PlayNightingale to make it the best game ever. https://t.co/E6xQlXsfBQFebruary 22, 2022
But due to the deal with Tencent, some considerable changes have taken place within Nightingale, and Improbable’s SpatialOS technology will no longer be used. The game was originally described as a “shared world survival crafting game” that takes place in “an interconnected web of beautiful, mysterious and dangerous realms”, but Flynn said it is now envisioned as “a more intimate single-player or smaller game” “There is no need for the large-scale capabilities of Improbable technology.
Fortunately, despite new ownership and changes in Nightingale’s direction, there doesn’t appear to be a delay in launch: Flynn says Inflexion looks forward to ‘working together’ [with Tencent] Nightingale launches in Early Access later this year. “