Former Telltale, Mark of the Ninja devs found new studio Campo Santo

Former Telltale developers Jake Rodkin and Sean Vanaman, Mark of the Ninja lead designer Nels Anderson, and ex-Studio Ghibli artist Olly Moss have joined forces to create a new studio called Campo Santo. And yes, there's already one game in the works.

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A group of developers, including designers from The Walking Dead and Mark of the Ninja, have banded together to create a new gaming studio. The newly-formed Campo Santo will be based out of San Francisco, CA, with at least one title already confirmed to be in development.

Campo Santo's starting lineup is Telltale veterans Jake Rodkin and Sean Vanaman, who were lead writers and designers on The Walking Dead, Mark of the Ninja lead designer Nels Anderson, and celebrated movie poster artist Olly Moss.

"As we talk to our friends and industry colleagues about 'doing something indie' with us, there's a shared pragmatism informed by years in the industry that melds with the lingering youthful enthusiasm that got us into games to begin with," Vanaman writes on the developer's blog. "Some of us want to tell stories, some of us want to build systems, and some of us want to create beautiful looking worlds, but we all want to make something."

Campo Santo's first title will be a collaboration with Portland-based app maker, Panic Inc. No word on when their first game will be released... or even what it's called, but it will be coming to PC, Mac, and Linux.

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Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?

From The Chatty
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    September 19, 2013 12:00 PM

    Ozzie Mejia posted a new article, Former Telltale, Mark of the Ninja devs found new studio Campo Santo.

    Former Telltale developers Jake Rodkin and Sean Vanaman, Mark of the Ninja lead designer Nels Anderson, and ex-Studio Ghibli artist Olly Moss have joined forces to create a new studio called Campo Santo. And yes, there's already one game in the works.

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      September 19, 2013 12:03 PM

      Whoa, I thought Jake and Sean were at Telltale for good. Very interesting! I bet that Nick Breckon drove them off.

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        September 19, 2013 12:10 PM

        It was that last game of Neptune's Pride.

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          September 19, 2013 4:33 PM

          It might be a smart idea to keep some distance from that guy... considering he is PURE EVIL!

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            September 19, 2013 11:10 PM

            I can't speak for Nick Breckon, but I personally prefer "creatively malevolent" myself.

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      September 19, 2013 12:52 PM

      Well, that explains a few things.

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      September 19, 2013 4:32 PM

      Whoa! This is huge! They did such a great job on Walking Dead! Two Idle thumbs (four Idle Thumbs) lost in one swing?!

      I'm very excited to see what they come up with... and what they are able to talk about on Idle Thumbs...

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      September 20, 2013 12:44 AM

      Jake is a cool dude. It was such a chance encounter during a SF Shackmeet where I told him about a parody newspaper pasted inside the doors of bathroom stalls on the UCSC campus where we both were alums. It made fun of UCSC news and events and was called "The Stall Street Journal." Turned out he was behind the whole thing and I was the first random person to have brought it up in conversation.

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