Epic Games announces opening of Impossible Studios

Epic Games announced the opening of Impossible Studios, a company comprised of highly skilled, senior-level game development talent. Based in Hunt Valley, Maryland, Impossible is the latest addition to Epic’s network, which includes corporate headquarters in Cary, North Carolina; ChAIR Entertainment in Salt Lake City, Utah; People Can Fly in Warsaw, Poland; Epic Games Korea in Seoul, Korea; and Epic Games Japan in Yokohama, Japan.

Founded in June, Impossible brings world-class game development expertise and creativity to Epic’s growing team. With heralded roots in real-time strategy and role-playing entertainment software, Impossible brings its own distinct design and technical sensibilities to Epic’s portfolio of games and game technology across major platforms.

Led by studio director Sean Dunn, Impossible’s first project is the touch-based action role-playing game “Infinity Blade: Dungeons” for iOS. “Infinity Blade: Dungeons,” which was conceived at Epic’s Cary studio, is being developed in collaboration with Epic and ChAIR under Impossible’s roof in Maryland.

Impossible consists of former employees of Big Huge Games, creators of the renowned “Rise of Nations” strategy games, “Catan” for Xbox LIVE Arcade, “Age of Empires III: The Asian Dynasties” for PC and “Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning” for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC. Big Huge Games earned the Baltimore Business Journal’s “Best Places to Work 2011” award and was also honored as one of Game Developer magazine’s top 30 developers in the world earlier this year.

The winged bear - logo of Impossible Games

“Epic Games has truly embraced this stellar collection of developers who were displaced by the closing of Big Huge Games,” said studio director Sean Dunn. “They have looked after us with complete care, giving us all the tools and resources we need to make a lot of gamers happy.”

“We were so glad we could help keep this great team together, and we’re lucky to have them,” said Epic Games President Dr. Michael Capps. “At the time, I said that finding a full team of superstars was ‘impossible’ and apparently the name stuck! Pairing the imagination and experience of Impossible with Epic’s technology, IP and resources makes for a business greater than the sum of its parts.”

Capps will lead an “Infinity Blade: Dungeons” panel with the game’s lead designer, Ian Frazier, and author, Brandon Sanderson, at Dragon*Con in Atlanta on August 31. “Infinity Blade: Dungeons” is set for release on the App Store later this year.

Epic Games is the creator of the popular Unreal engine. The Unreal Engine has been one of the most popular and versatile game engines to be released. It has powered many games, some of the more popular ones being the Gears of War series for the Xbox 360, the BioShock series and the Batman Arkham series, among others.

Epic unveiled Unreal Engine 4 by showing a video of live gameplay of its tech demo Elemental. The video had amazing lighting, which seemed to be the focus of the latest iteration of Epic’s Unreal Engine. Some upcoming games using the Unreal Engine other than Fortnite, which will debut Unreal Engine 4, will be Borderlands 2, BioShock Infinite and Devil May Cry, among others.