There is life beyond the ashes of Curt Schilling's 38 Studios, as seven former employees of the imploded Rhode Island gaming company came to PAX East yesterday to talk about the new studios they've started.
Featured on a panel at the video gaming convention, the budding entrepreneurs — most of whom have set up shop in the Bay State — join what's become a huge increase in the number of gaming and digital company startups in Massachusetts, up 78 percent from three years ago.
With the increased presence of indie gaming companies at PAX one of the big stories of this weekend's event, there's consensus that some of the most creative ideas in gaming are coming not out of the risk-averse mega companies, but rather from small studios, many based here.
The seven former 38 Studios employees confirmed that perception.
"Curt used to tell us that he hoped 38 Studios was the last place we'd work unless we started our own studios," said Joe Mirabello, who started Sharon-based Terrible Posture Games right after losing his job.
"It didn't pan out with his company so I decided that if I was going to work for a place that could go out of business it might as well be my own," Mirabello said.
Everyone on the panel said the spectacular collapse of Schilling's company was devastating, but it lit a fire under them. And while all refused to dish dirt on their former boss, they said that the collegial environment, which came before the abrupt flameout, had bonded former 38 Studios workers into a "brotherhood."
"We continue to take solace in one another and some have become close friends and help one another," said Geraldo Perez, who started King Bee Digital Games.
"It's been hard, but the video game industry has always been volatile," Perez said.
Rich Gallup got a job as a producer for fast-growing Disruptor Beam, but on the side started Summer Camp Studios.
"After what happened, my company's name was a way of picturing all of us all sent to a safe haven where we could go and learn new things," Gallup said.
Gallup said that most of the roughly 400 former employees of 38 Studios have found work, with about half of them staying in the area and half relocating across the country.
"The attention this got opened a few doors," he admitted.
"But these were talented people, and that's why they found other jobs," he said.
Not everyone is making money off their new ventures, although a number of their games, mostly mobile-based, are for sale. Some said they relied on savings, others had a spouse with a good job, but a few are still living hand-to-mouth, determined to follow their passion to make games.
"My idea and my need was to make a game I wanted to play, and when I started it didn't matter if I made any money," said Paul Siegel, founder of Dancing Sorcerer Games.
Gallup has a better idea.
"My dream scenario is that companies put money in a fund, and if they go out of business workers can tap into that to do the games they want to do."
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