Daylight, Blacklight, Spec Ops developer shuttered

Daylight developer Zombie Studios has thrown in the towel.

Blacklight: Retribution has been handed over to new start up Builder Box, a team formed by past Blacklight developers. Zombie Studios did not give details of what will happen to the rest of its IP and assets.

The closure seems to be quite peaceful, as there's no report of financial issues. Instead, it looks like the company's big wigs are ready to move on.

"The owners of Zombie Studios are retiring," a post on the Zombie Studios website announced.

The Seattle-based Zombie Studios has been in business for 20 years. Its first major title was Zork: Nemesis, but it also debuted the Spec Ops IP and developed the core series until 2001, and was behind Konami's SAW games.

More recently, it was known for the Blacklight series and recent horror effort Daylight, which is pretty scary.

Here's the developer's farewell letter in full:

So long, and thanks for all the fish

It has been over 20 years since it all started. Zombie was formed in the same year that Forrest Gump was released, Sony’s PlayStation launched, and Justin Bieber was born. It was also four years before Goole was founded, and four years before Half-life was released. Since then we have published our own and been a part of over 30 titles, worked on every major console, partnered with nearly every publisher, and even did a bit of work for the US Army. Now it is time for us to part ways and close our doors.

The owners of Zombie Studios are retiring and wish to thank you, our fans, for years of support you have provided us. It has been awesome working with all the various technology over the years, both hardware and software, growing with the industry and out fans, and producing fun games and technology of our own. We also wish to thank our employees, both present and past. Your dedication and passion to gaming is what Zombie was all about.

Lastly, we want to congratulate and wish nothing but success to Builder Box, the new studio starting up that has acquired some of the work Zombie is parting with, including all rights to Blacklight: Retribution. The new studio is comprised of past Zombie employees that put their hearts into Blacklight and we have no doubts will continue to do so.

Thank you, and game on.

Zombie Studios
1994 - 2015

Thanks, Polygon.