With Mike Morhaine’s company planning to release another game in the near future, the Blizzard Entertainment co-founder has a lot on his plate…
Morhaine’s new studio, Dreamhaven, first made headlines in 2020. More than 100 people work there, and their first game will be announced soon. Although we’ll have to wait a little longer for details (maybe until December, when this year’s The Game Awards will be held, essentially the gaming industry’s year-end party; after that, everyone will be focused on Christmas), it’s official that Dreamhaven will be releasing another game.
One of the games announced on the opening night of Gamescom, Lynked: Banner of the Spark. This was reported by Bloomberg editor Jason Schreier. This game is being developed by FuzzyBot, a studio created specifically to create vibrant and colorful projects, as the team members have previously developed darker, more gory games in their previous jobs. The other Dreamhaven-related game will be released in October. Secret Door, one of the company’s in-house studios, is working on it, and it’s being led by former Blizzard veteran Chris Sigaty. He was previously executive producer on Starcraft II.
Morhaine spoke to Bloomberg about how difficult it was to keep a going concern afloat during the pandemic. They had financial problems that caused several Secret Door games to miss several internal deadlines, which is why it’s only being announced now. Eric Dodds, the former director of Hearthstone, resigned for personal reasons, so the late 2020 plans now look a little out of place. Sigaty says the first Secret Door game could be released in 2025, but with a small team working on a small budget, there could be delays.
What is the future of Dreamhaven games? “The size of these games will probably not be the size of a Blizzard game. But the quality bar that we’re trying to hit is still there. We’re still trying to put out high-quality, published games that people can love and enjoy and share with their friends,” Morhaime said. They will also help market games from the company’s other in-house studio, Moonshot.
So the fate of Dreamhaven is shaping up…
