Spicy Horse
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 | |
| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Video games |
| Founded | 2007 |
| Founder | American McGee Anthony Jacobson Adam Lang |
| Defunct | 2016 |
| Headquarters | Shanghai, China |
Area served | Worldwide |
Key people | American McGee Ken Wong R. J. Berg |
| Products | Alice: Madness Returns |
Number of employees | 6 (2016)[1] |
| Website | www.spicyhorse.com |
Spicy Horse (simplified Chinese: 麻辣马; traditional Chinese: 麻辣馬; pinyin: Má là mǎ) was a Shanghai-based independent video game developer started by American McGee, Anthony Jacobson, and Adam Lang in 2007. It was announced on July 23, 2016, that the company is closing its doors to focus on smaller indie development.[1] The studio is best known for Alice: Madness Returns, the sequel to American McGee's Alice.
After shutting his then-company The Mauretania Import Export Company, American McGee flew to Asia to seek business opportunities.[2] From there, he met a pool of talented people in China who had been working and outsourcing games for western developers for many years but did not have any creative control over the IPs. American saw this as a favourable circumstance and decided to form a company in Shanghai to not only provide job opportunities to local talents but to also offer a healthy work environment.[3]
The studio was established in 2007. It was called a studio "leading the way" in episodic games.[4][5] It was the largest independent Western developer in China.[6]
Spicy Horse employed more than 70 people at their studio in Zhabei District, Shanghai.[7] The company's development process utilized a "core team" methodology and 100% outsourced art asset production to conserve energy directed at the core competencies of game development.[8]
Following rumors regarding the studio's closure, on March 29, 2016, McGee acknowledged that there had been some layoffs but they will continue to operate and will look to move away from F2P mobile games in the future.[9]
In 2016, McGee announced the closure of Spicy Horse after 10 years of development. He plans to focus on indie development using Patreon and work on a different work environment like his sailboat.[1]