Fullbright (company)
| File:Fullbright-logo.png | |
| Formerly | The Fullbright Company (2012–2014) |
|---|---|
| Company type | Private |
| Industry | Video games |
| Founded | March 2012 |
| Founder |
|
| Headquarters | , US |
| Products | |
Number of employees | 1 (2023) |
| Website | fullbrig |
Fullbright (formerly The Fullbright Company) is an American indie video game developer based in Portland, Oregon, best known for its 2013 title Gone Home. Before forming Fullbright, Steve Gaynor, Johnnemann Nordhagen, and Karla Zimonja had worked together on Minerva's Den, the single-player expansion to BioShock 2. During the development of Gone Home, the team worked and lived together in the same house. After its release, Nordhagen left to found a new studio, Dim Bulb Games. Fullbright's next game, Tacoma, was released in August 2017. As of 2023, Gaynor is the sole employee of Fullbright.
History
Minerva's Den and founding
The Fullbright Company was formed by Steve Gaynor, Johnnemann Nordhagen, and Karla Zimonja in March 2012.[1] Kate Craig, an environment artist, joined the company full-time in August 2012.[1] They had previously worked together at other video game developers but "were attracted to the artistic liberty and self-management of a small game studio", with the freedoms of working without rigid schedules and relationships.[2] The three founders lived and worked together in a northeast Portland, Oregon house known as the Fullbright House. Craig worked remotely from Vancouver.[2] Craig likened the group to a band due to the closeness partially necessitated by lack of money, such as in sharing flights and lodging.[2]
Gone Home
Gone Home is a video game that features a female protagonist. It included support for controllers, which Polygon credited to the team's experience on AAA first-person shooters. In its first weeks following release, Gone Home was a top seller on Steam and covered in The New York Times.[3] It won "Best Debut" at the 2014 BAFTA Game Awards and 2014 Game Developers Choice Awards,[4][5] as well as Polygon's 2013 game of the year.[6] Its release begat discussions about narrative and gameplay in video games, for the game's focus on empathic story and lack of gun-based gameplay.[3] The Fullbright Company partnered with indie publisher Midnight City to produce a console port of Gone Home. Fullbright originally built the game for personal computers so as to not worry about the design limitations and optimizations necessary for a console release. Wanting to move on to their next game, the company sought out a publisher to do the porting work for them.[3] Following release, Nordhagen left to found his own studio, Dim Bulb Games, in June 2014.[7] The Fullbright Company rebranded itself as Fullbright two months later, on August 4, 2014, and wrote that its continued focus would be on "immersive, unforgettable story exploration video games".[1][8] Chris Plante of Polygon cited Fullbright as an example of "smaller, independently owned studios" whose games show signs of social progress in the video game medium.[3]
Tacoma
Fullbright announced their next game, Tacoma, at The Game Awards 2014. The brief trailer featured a radio dialogue between a man and a woman, set in the Lunar Transfer Station Tacoma 200,000 miles from Earth. Polygon noted that its aesthetic was similar to Rapture, the underwater city of BioShock. Tacoma was released on August 2, 2017 on PC and Xbox One.[9]
Open Roads and issues with Gaynor's behaviour
Games
| Year | Title | Platform(s) | Publisher |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2013 | Gone Home | Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch | The Fullbright Company |
| 2017 | Tacoma | Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch | The Fullbright Company |
| 2024 | Fullbright Presents: Toilet Spiders | Windows (early access) | Fullbright |
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 "About The Fullbright Company". The Fullbright Company. Archived from the original on 2018-11-28. Retrieved 2019-11-20.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Mahardy, Mike (August 13, 2013). "Meet Me in Portland: The Fullbright Company's Journey Home". Polygon. Vox Media. Archived from the original on December 8, 2014. Retrieved December 6, 2014.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Tach, Dave (March 11, 2014). "Why Double Fine and Fullbright teamed up with Midnight City". Polygon. Vox Media. Archived from the original on April 7, 2014. Retrieved December 6, 2014.
- ↑ Savage, Phil (March 12, 2014). "Papers, Please and Gone Home take BAFTA Awards, Houser brothers make rare appearance for Rockstar's". PC Gamer. Future Publishing. Archived from the original on December 10, 2014. Retrieved December 6, 2014.
- ↑ Aziz, Hamza (March 19, 2014). "GDC Awards led by The Last of Us, Papers, Please". Destructoid. Game Revolution. Archived from the original on December 11, 2014. Retrieved December 6, 2014.
- ↑ Hall, Charlie (December 5, 2014). "Tacoma is the next game from Gone Home developer Fullbright". Polygon. Vox Media. Archived from the original on December 8, 2014. Retrieved December 6, 2014.
- ↑ Pitcher, Jenna (June 19, 2014). "Gone Home developer establishes new studio to explore the outer edges of games". Polygon. Vox Media. Archived from the original on December 7, 2014. Retrieved December 6, 2014.
- ↑ McElroy, Griffin (August 4, 2014). "Gone Home developer rebrands and expands". Polygon. Vox Media. Archived from the original on December 8, 2014. Retrieved December 6, 2014.
- ↑ Elliott, James (2017-07-30). "Video game releases for August 2017". Polygon. Archived from the original on 2023-09-03. Retrieved 2020-06-02.
External links
- File:Commons-logo.svg Media related to Fullbright at Wikimedia Commons
- Official website
