Yellow Brick Games debuts with Dragon Age creator Mike Laidlaw

Yellow Brick Games has debuted has a new studio led by video game industry veterans Mike Laidlaw (former creative director of the Dragon Age series), Thomas Giroux, Jeff Skalski, and Frédéric St-Laurent B.

It’s another example of the boom in game studios, fueled by historic growth during the pandemic and support from game venture capital funds, which have invested billions of dollars in more than 100 studios in the past nine months.

The team has opened an independent studio dedicated to making original games. The developers have had leading roles in studios at Ubisoft, Electronic Arts, and BioWare. They worked on big franchises like Dragon Age, Mass Effect, Watch Dogs, and Assassin’s Creed. Now the team is working on its first major project in Québec City, Canada, which has become a big hub for gaming.

“We have learned a lot from working on world-class, multi-year projects with thousands of colleagues, and we want to take a different approach,” COO and executive producer Skalski said in a statement. “Leveraging a smaller talented team where people come first, we will create amazing worlds and experiences for all others to enjoy. The market is moving fast, and we have no desire to play catchup and chase it when we can influence where it goes. These goals drove us to found Yellow Brick Games.”

Giroux serves as CEO, after spending a decade at Ubisoft Montréal and then founding Sunny Side Up Creative, a video games marketing agency that was acquired by global video game service provider Keywords Studios in 2019.

Laidlaw is chief creative officer and was one of the creative pillars behind the award-winning Dragon Age and Jade Empire.

“The market for independently produced games is growing rapidly, and the technology is keeping pace,” Laidlaw said in a statement. “Small, diverse teams can now create high-quality experiences. For veterans of big-studio productions like myself and much of our team, this is the perfect time to get back to a small, agile, and highly motivated group. We want our games here at Yellow Brick to take potentially millions of players on wonderous journeys, and we want every member of our team to have a direct impact on the new worlds we’re creating.”

St-Laurent B. also worked at Ubisoft, and Sarbakan and will take on the role of game director within the new team.

“The rise of remote work has rewritten the rules and is opening up opportunities to recruit talent from around the world. We have additional employees based in Montreal and other countries, but we couldn’t be more proud and happier to be doing this from the heart of Québec City,” St-Laurent B. said in a statement.

Yellow Brick Games has 15 people working on the new game. The studio didn’t take any questions or comment on whether it has raised money, but it expects to grow its team in the coming months and years.