Fortnite and Call of Duty veterans raise $15m to form Methodical Games

Methodical Games is a new AAA games studio formed by games veterans from Epic Games, Respawn and Infinity Ward.

The team has raised $15m via a funding round that was led by Lightspeed Ventures. Other investors include Bitkraft Ventures, 1Up Ventures, Transcend Fund and Infinity Ward and Respawn Entertainment founder Jason West. Several angel investors are also involved.

The nine-person start-up team is led by three founders: Francesco Gigliotti, Adam Bellefeuil and Dave Ratti. Gigliotti is the CEO and Game Director and was most recently engineering fellow at Epic Games, where he helped create Fortnite. Prior to that he was a founding member of Respawn, leading the engineering team on Titanfall. He also spent eight years overseeing gameplay engineering on Call of Duty at Infinity Ward.

Bellefeuil is the design director at the new company, and spent 15 years at Epic Games where he was also part of the Fortnite team. Finally, Ratti is technical director and is another Epic Games veteran. He spent 10 years as one of the Unreal Engine Directors and has worked on titles such as Fortnite, Doom and Rage.

The team says that their first game is not a multiplayer shooter, despite their past experience, but it is a "multiplayer action adventure game with an emphasis on close-quarters combat set in a fantastical world."

Other members of the team include animation director Jay Hosfelt (Unreal, Fortnite, Gears of War), visual FX director Robert Gains (Titanfall, Call of Duty), Principal Engineer Richard Baker (Apex Legends, Titanfall) and Principal Environment Artist Lewis Walden (Apex Legends, God of War 2 and 3)