Back when it raised an additional $25 million in funding, and bought iPhone publisher Freeverse, ngmoco CEO Neil Young said the company was looking for future acquisitions.
And now it's fulfilled that promise, buying Stumptown Game Machine, for an undisclosed sum.
It's not looked too far from home however as it already publishes the Portland, Oregon studio's Touch Pets Dogs.
Smart thinking
Founded by Andrew Stern - one of the brainiacs behind the Facade AI tech demo, and creator of the Petz brand for Ubisoft - the acquisition also sees Richard Evans, the AI expert behind Lionhead's Black & White, and The Sims 3 for EA, join the company.
Ngmoco has been an incredibly supportive and creative partner from the beginning of Touch Pets Dogs, said Andrew Stern.
Formally joining the team strengthens our collaboration and creates the opportunity to make exciting new games.
To date, Touch Pets Dogs - which is free-to-play - has been downloaded over five million times. The companies are working on another game in the Touch Pets series too.
Warm embrace
"The idea of getting acquired just clicked and made sense," Stern told Gamasutra.
"It gave us the resources to grow more and do even bigger, more exciting, innovative products together. The vision that ngmoco has, and I have, for the project I want to make is very well-aligned, so it just made sense to join forces."
Stumptown will continue to be run as a separate studio within what's called the ngmoco family of companies, alongside Freeverse and Epic Pet Wars developer Miraphonic, which was the first company ngmoco bought in November 2009.
[source: BusinessWire]
News
Contributing Editor
A Pocket Gamer co-founder, Jon is Contributing Editor at PG.biz which means he acts like a slightly confused uncle who's forgotten where he's left his glasses. As well as letters and cameras, he likes imaginary numbers and legumes.
Related Articles
Interview
Jul 17th, 2015
Flashback Friday: Neil Young on how ngmoco and Freeverse will dominate the iPhone free2play market
Top Stories
News
5 hours, 42 minutes ago
PocketGamer.biz Podcast Week in Views E11 - Xbox in turmoil, Krafton champions AI development, and Apple's iPad challenge
News
May 10th, 2024
Unity says restructure that saw mass layoffs is now complete as it posts Q1 2024 revenue decline
News
May 10th, 2024
Week in Views - Xbox's mobile games store is doomed to fail, Sonic meets the Angry Birds, and Apple's iPad problem
Feature
May 10th, 2024
New release roundup: The best new mobile games from a round of roguelikes to a Sonic surprise
Events
Valencia Indie Summit 2024 | Europe | May 16th |
Digital Dragons | Europe | May 19th |
GamesBeat Summit 2024 | North America | May 20th |
Mobidictum Meetup Tallinn May 2024 | Europe | May 21st |
Nordic Game Spring 2024 | Nordic | May 21st |
Impact 2024 - Indie Games | May 23rd | |
Israel Mobile Summit 2024 | Middle East | Jun 6th |
Future Games Show 2024 | Jun 8th |