Celebrating 10 years of Firesprite on this special anniversary
Today marks an important milestone for Firesprite, our studio turns 10 years old! As we celebrate this significant anniversary, we’re taking time to reflect on our journey so far and the exciting things which lie ahead.
Throughout November, we’ll be taking a look back over the last 10 years. From delivering world firsts in technology, working with iconic characters and game words, the development of our first special IP, and joining the PlayStation Studios family; it’s been a decade packed with action, excitement, collaboration, fun, and so many proud moments for our whole team!
Our Managing Director, Graeme Ankers, said, “We’ve always been about pushing genres forward, harnessing what new technology or ideas can do for our players, and that’s really been the pillar of what we wanted for Firesprite.
One of the values that we’ve held since the beginning is that we’re an inclusive business, not only in a diversity sense, but also in how we include everybody’s perspective. Every sprite has a voice at Firesprite. Anyone can have an influence on what Firesprite is - from a low-level feature in a game, to an idea, to a process improvement, we’re always working toward doing better, growing, and getting to that point of being globally significant; a journey that started 10 years ago today.
We’ve stayed true to our values and it’s so fantastic to see what we’ve achieved since 2012. Our vision is to become a globally leading game developer and we’re very focussed on delivering to the highest level on the global stage.
We’ve got a great project coming up in Horizon Call of the Mountain which is going to be the start of the next chapter of Firesprite’s journey, followed by all of our other exciting projects."
This month, our game teams will be sharing insights from their time on The Playroom, Run Sackboy! Run!, The Playroom VR, Nightfall and The Persistence. Be sure you’re following us on social for all the latest updates on these special reflections - and for all the latest knowledge sharing articles, industry insights, and career advice from our talented sprites!
As well as our mission to deliver ground-breaking and immersive interactive experiences for our incredible players; another focus for Firesprite over the last decade has been giving back and developing initiatives to support both our talented sprites and studio values.
We’ve been proud to partner with and sponsor the wonderful Safe in Our World, UKIE, Women in Games, and Coding Black Females. Organisations taking significant and effective steps to promote inclusivity, representation, and wellbeing within the industry. We’re also proud to have planted 23,375 trees so far in partnership with environmental social enterprise, Ecologi, a cause we continue to contribute to monthly as part of our climate positive pledge.
We’ve recently taken steps to strengthen our commitment to DE&I. With our D&I and LGBTQIA+ groups championing our recent Pride at Firesprite series, and lunch and learn sessions for the whole studio. We’ve been delighted to host Global Butterflies for three insightful trans and non-binary awareness workshops, and Voice at The Table who joined us last month for the first of our inclusive recruitment and unconscious bias training sessions.
Our sprites and incredible community have very proudly helped us raise £12,790 collectively across several fundraising events for PAPYRUS Prevention of Young Suicide, Macmillan Cancer Support, George House Trust & Albert Kennedy Trust, Mermaids and SpecialEffect, and we’re so excited to continue our mission to give back to invaluable causes like these.
From a team of our 5 founders to now 300 sprites strong. Firesprite and our beloved community of players old and new have grown exponentially since 2012. Since joining the PlayStation Studios family in 2021, we were beyond delighted to receive such a warm welcome from our fellow PlayStation Studios and the vibrant PlayStation fanbase! PlayStation strive to deliver incredible experiences for their players, and we look forward to honouring that legacy.
Currently we’re working with our good friends at Guerrilla to deliver Horizon Call of The Mountain, a brand-new Horizon adventure for PlayStation VR2, and we truly can’t wait to share more exciting news and updates with you all in the future as our journey as a PlayStation Studio continues.
A huge thank you to every single one of our sprites, partners, and players who have joined us at any stage of our journey. We’re truly grateful to everyone who has been a part of our story. Thank you for 10 magical years, here’s to the next 10!
