THQ Montreal will be a two team studio working on 'great, original IP'
During a press event in Montreal this morning, THQ Core Games veep – and certified Straight Shooter™ – Danny Bilson took the opportunity to not only welcome Assassin's Creed designer Patrice Désilets to the newly created THQ Montreal studio, but to also tell the assembled press that THQ would be "building a second large-scale game in that studio. It's a two-game studio." To fuel that type of production, Bilson said that THQ Montreal will be the "largest studio in the THQ system," hiring as many as 400 developers over the next five years. If we didn't know better, we'd guess that the majority of Montreal is inhabited exclusively by game developers at this point.
"We look forward to filling this place with some of the best game makers in the world," Bilson said. "Starting with Patrice and his team and followed by a second team that I haven't announced yet and we're not going to."
When asked if the studio would be working on the unnamed Guillermo Del Toro project, Bilson teased, "Have we announced that? Uh, no." Instead, Bilson offered the following: "They'll be awesome core games" and "great, original IP." He did concede, "We do look to see what the transmedia opportunities are to make the games more important." While that's not quite the same thing as saying, "Yes, Guillermo Del Toro is making a movie and a game and there will be comic books and action figures," we'll all pretend.
Ultimately, Bilson wanted everyone to understand that this morning's announcements – centered around the new studio and the hiring of Patrice Désilets – are intended to continue to weave the story of a new THQ. "We've all been in beautiful facilities at many companies that turned out a 68-rated Metacritic game," Bilson said. "It's not about the facility but the people we put in the facility." We might not know who's leading up this second team, but with recent hires like Désilets and partnerships with developers like Tomonobu Itagaki, we're increasingly bullish on THQ.
