10tactle Studios founds new subsidiary in Belgium

German publisher 10tacle Studios AG has continued its rapid expansion with the acquisition of a majority shareholding in Belgian developer Elsewhere Entertainment and the appointment of two key staff in its management team.

Elsewhere Entertainment was founded in 2001 by Yves Grolet, following the worldwide success of his adventure title 'Outcast', which was published in 1999 by Infogrames. Elsewhere has spent several years developing a new game engine dubbed 'NeoReality', which, according to the company, incorporates "groundbreaking rendering technology." The engine has been designed to accommodate current generation PC and console titles, though its primary use is for creation and development of next generation software titles.

Michele Pes, CEO of 10tacle Studios reinforced the importance of the acquisition for the company's future projects and continued expansion, stating: "The investment in Elsewhere is a big step for the future of 10tacle. It is very important for us that we now have access to a high-end engine which we can use for our upcoming projects."

"Yves Grolet's team has done an excellent job by developing the NeoReality engine and we are proud that we can now continue to work with this new technology together," he added.

For Elsewhere's part in the bargain, the company will now have access to essential revenue, resources and expertise to begin utilising its game engine technology for the creation of next generation games. At present, no specific new projects for the newly formed 10tacle Studios Belgium have been announced.

10tacle, already employing over a hundred associates in Darmstadt, Hanover, Bratislava, and Singapore, continues its expansion and market growth ambitions with the announcement of two new management hires as Stephan Pietsch and Martin Szymanski join the team.

Pietsch will assume the role of senior product manager, a position he has held for over 5 years at Atari Germany, where he worked on leading brands including Unreal Tournament, Neverwinter Nights and the V-Rally racing series.

Szymanksi brings seven years PR and marketing experience to the team, and will look after online PR and international community management for 10tacle's brands. Having worked in the industry since 1997, Szymanski has worked on the PR and marketing campaigns for several Atari franchises including Enter the Matrix and Driver 3.