Last week, Playdead co-founder Dino Patti launched a new studio after leaving the Limbo and Inside developer due to a conflict with fellow founder, Arnt Jensen.
The pair established the studio back in 2006, but reports suggest that after over a decade working together, a long-running feud boiled over and ultimately forced Patti to step down and sell his 49 percent stake in the firm.
Details on why the duo quarreled are scarce. It’s clear something happened, but nobody is quite sure what. In a recent interview with Eurogamer, however, Patti shed a glimmer of light on the situation by confirming that there was indeed “some kind of fallout.”
“It is kind of delicate. It’s also combined with other personal reasons. I really like Playdead, it’s something that’s deep in my heart. I love the people there, they’re still my friends. I’m on speaking terms with 98 per cent of the people there,” he said.
“For me it was just time to do something else. I found a way to do it in a way where I could do whatever I wanted afterwards.”
The fact that Patti says he’s on speaking terms with the majority of staff seems to confirm the notion that he resigned because of an issue with Jensen alone.
Despite the fact that his stay at Playdead came to something of a sticky end, it’s great to see that Patti can still appreciate the work the studio is doing. As for his future plans, he says he co-founded new outfit Jumpship to help nurture and protect original game ideas.
“It’s so easy to destroy original ideas,” he explained. “There’s a lot of lack of quality in games – a lot of games value being done on time before they value quality. But it’s really important to have it.”
To hear more from Patti, be sure to check out the full interview over on Eurogamer.