Apple has bought its first video game studio, and will finally be publishing games. The acquired Vancouver-based studio, RAC7, is a small team founded in 2014 by Jason Ennis and Jesse Ringrose.
This represents an important change in how Apple interacts with the gaming industry. While the tech giant has been a big presence in mobile gaming for years through its App Store and the Apple Arcade subscription service, this purchase is its first step into directly owning a game development company. Instead of just supplying the means of gameplay, Apple wants to make games directly for its services.
RAC7 has a strong history of making creative games. Before its major success, the studio made a name for itself with the release ofDark Echoin 2015 andSplitter Crittersin 2018, both of which received positive feedback. However, its 2019 release ofSneaky Sasquatch, an exclusive game for Apple Arcade, really put RAC7 in the spotlight.Sneaky Sasquatchis a great mobile game and is one of Apple Arcade’s most popular titles.
Apple toldInsider Gaming, “We love Sneaky Sasquatch and are excited that the 2-person RAC7 team has joined Apple to continue their work on it with us. We will continue to deliver a great experience for Apple Arcade players with hundreds of games from many of the best game developers in the world.”
The company bought the studio to “help the team grow its game more on Apple Arcade.” Apple seems to be trying to play down the importance of the deal by making it seem like it’s helping the studio and not issuing a public post. However, this is a huge deal.
Since Apple benefits from having great exclusives in its marketplace, it only makes sense to purchase the developer of one of its most popular games. Apple is acting like a regular first-party publisher with a deal we’d normally see from Microsoft or Sony. We’d see console makers do this maneuver to keep a successful team from making games for competitors like Epic Games or Google Play.
Even more so, if Apple had intended to enter the gaming industry in earnest, this would have been the smartest way to go about it. The team is already part of Apple’s ecosystem rather than a big shift toward building a massive in-house game development division.
The immediate effect of the acquisition will likely focus on further developing and expandingSneaky Sasquatchand its developer. We’ll likely see sequels, more employees added to the team, and a lot of pressure on RAC7.
This purchase was just a matter of time. As the mobile gaming market keeps growing rapidly, big tech companies should look for ways to get more involved in game development and make games that have mobile devices in mind.
