A number of veteran Maxis employees who worked on the most recent SimCity game have left the company to found an independent studio.
Ocean Quigley, who was creative director and art director on this year’s troubled SimCity, announced on Twitter that he’d left Maxis along with engineering lead Andrew Willmott and lead gameplay engineer Dan Moskowitz to found a new indie developer, called Jellygrade.
The new venture’s website describes the team as “a few recovering ex-AAA game developers, now looking to make the kinds of games we love on mobile.” In the past, the trio had served as lead developers on SimCity 4, SimCity 3k, Spore and The Sims 2, as well as others. Regarding why they left, apparently there was no animosity involved, with Quigley explaining, “It was time – I have lots of affection for Maxis, but eventually you have to move on.”
Nothing too substantial has been revealed about Jellygrade’s debut project, though Quigley did write, “We’re making a simulation about the dawn of life on earth; about lava, water, rock and the emergence of the first primordial creatures.” A concept image for the project is below.
