If the question of the rise and dominance of social games has ever come into question, a perusal through the past years headlines, and the associated talent defecting to smaller, up-and-coming social games firms should give a pretty clear picture as to what’s going on. Chalk up another major shift in the social gaming industry, as SGN has recently announced that they’ve been on a bit of a hiring binge as of late, and have netted some serious talent.
Former Electronic Arts and LucasArts executive Randy Breen will now be reporting to SGN’s CEO Shervin Pishevar, in his new role as Chief Operating Officer. Breen, a long time and founding executive at EA, was responsible for the Road Rash series of games, one that’s sold million of copies and spawned a number of sequels and off shoots. Likewise, at LucasArts Breen was the man in charge of overseeing product developments within the Star Wars and Indiana Jones license lines.
Serving as new Director of Game design at SGN is Randy Angle, another industry veteran, who’s worked on a number of projects, most notably the Lord of the Rings. Another EA vet, Margaret Foley-Mauvais has been hired to serve as Art Director, while Dan Brazelton joins the SGN team in the role of Executive Producer. Brazelton brings to the table 17 years of gaming and film industry experience. And rounding out the new netting at SGN is Adriana Gasoigne, formerly of Hi5, who will be serving as the company’s Director of Global Communications.
“We’ve experienced tremendous growth over the past year, and I’m thrilled we have attracted a leader like Randy Breen to SGN and assembled a world class team to capitalize on our position within the booming social gaming industry,” said Shervin Pishevar, CEO of SGN, in a statement.
Based in Palo Alto, California, SGN has now topped over 100 hires, and has been in operation since 2007. Owing their success to the rise of social gaming, SGN has also served as a primary influencer in and producer of such titles in the social gaming space. Their first success can be attributed to a Facebook app, Warbook, and SGN quickly followed up this success with a number of additional titles. Quickly spreading their reach to Myspace and Bebo applications, SGN started focusing on iPhone games over the past year.
While they may have had a decent following and interest in their work with social network based games, this expansion into iPhone games is what truly put the company on the map. SGN has sold over 400,000 copies of it’s F.A.S.T. jet fighter game, and approximately 24 percent of all iPhone and iPod touch users have a copy of the firms successful iBowl app on their device. And lest we forget that it was SGN that was the very first to bring the successful Mafia games genre to market.
Again, it’s quite clear to see what’s going on here. A number of execs and non-execs alike are either fed up with, or see greater opportunities in social gaming then the traditional stalwarts of the industry. Granted, a number of larger games development firms are now interested in, and/or beginning their own exploration of social gaming, but is it already too late?
