Kwalee

Kwalee Ltd.
Company typePrivate
IndustryVideo games
Founded2011; 13 years ago (2011)
FounderDavid Darling
Headquarters
Leamington Spa
,
England
Area served
Worldwide
Key people
SubsidiariesTictales
Websitekwalee.com

Kwalee Ltd. is a British video game developer and publisher. The company was founded in May 2011 by David Darling, co-founder and former CEO of Codemasters who is hailed as one of the 'founding fathers' of the UK games industry.[1] The company publishes games on mobile, PC and console platforms. It is known for its hypercasual games for iOS and Android devices, with a large internal development studio helping the company to more than 700 million game downloads in total. Based in Leamington Spa[2] in the county of Warwickshire, Kwalee is one of the several companies that make up the Leamington Spa video gaming cluster.

As of 2022, the company also has offices in Bangalore,[3] Beijing[4] and Portugal.[5]

Kwalee employs over 180 technical, marketing, publishing and administrative staff in its offices,[6] including Andrew Graham (designer and programmer of Micro Machines) and COO Jason Falcus (programmer of NBA Jam[7]). In 2020, the company began to publish PC and console games with Max Everingham joining from Team17 to head up a new division.[8] TENS! and Eternal Hope were the first PC and console game releases from Kwalee, with the one-hit-kill fighting game Die by the Blade set to launch in 2023,[9] shifting away from its initial plan to release the game in November 2022.[10]

  1. ^ "Leamington Festival Celebrates the Making of Silicon Spa". Warwickshire County Council. 14 May 2013.
  2. ^ "Kwalee's David Darling on the new challenge of making games and apps for iOS | interview". PocketGamer.biz. 14 September 2011. Retrieved 29 June 2012.
  3. ^ Kumar, Nitesh (19 May 2020). "Mobile games developer Kwalee to open first overseas studio in India". TechRadar. Retrieved 26 October 2021.
  4. ^ "Kwalee to open Chinese office". GamesIndustry.biz. Retrieved 26 October 2021.
  5. ^ "Kwalee opens new office in Portugal". European Gaming. 12 May 2022. Retrieved 12 May 2022.
  6. ^ Hughes, Ian (20 February 2020). "Million pound plus bonus payout for staff at Leamington firm". Leamington Observer.
  7. ^ Crookes, David (26 August 2014). "Games Developers Jason Falcus and David Darling to Reunite at Kwalee". The Independent.
  8. ^ Barton, Seth (29 January 2021). "Kwalee hires industry veteran Max Everingham from Team17 to lead console and PC publishing drive". MCV. ISSN 1469-4832. Retrieved 26 October 2021.
  9. ^ "Die by the Blade - Important Announcement About Our Release Date ⚔️ - Steam News". store.steampowered.com. 25 October 2022. Retrieved 20 November 2022.
  10. ^ "Live by the sword when one-hit-kill fighter Die by the Blade arrives next year". PlayStation.Blog. 30 September 2021. Retrieved 26 October 2021.