Sony Liverpool vets form Sawfly Studios, new IP in the works

Sawfly Studios has been formed by former Sony Studio Liverpool members Mike Humphrey, Karl Jones, Jon Eggelton, and Andrew Jones.

Together, the team has accumulated over 50 years of experience working on such titles as Wipeout, Motorstorm and Formula 1, as well as studios such as Bizarre Creations, Warner Brothers and Evolution Studios.

“As soon as news went out about the studio closure we were all approached by large developers regarding new jobs,” says SawflyMD Mike Humphrey. “To be honest, our first instinct was to take positions with those relatively secure companies. However, the more we thought about it the more we realized that we had something more to contribute to the games industry.

"We knew that the only way to make our own games, exactly the way we wanted to make them, was to start our own studio. At Sawfly we want to create amazing and memorable gameplay experiences under our own terms, so that's exactly what we're doing."

Sawfly have started work on a new IP, and is something the team "had a lot of experience with while working internally for Sony," and are also taking on contracts for other companies.

“Pitching your own ideas is great and extremely satisfying, but we were keen to hit the ground running," said Karl Jones, Sawfly's design director. "Early on we secured work by signing production deals with a couple of different companies, which we are extremely happy about. We expect details of those to be announced in due course.”

The first title from the firm, will be published by Ripstone, with details to be released soon. The game is apparently "really cheeky, irreverent and a hell of a lot of fun," according to the studio page.

Sawfly Studios are currently housed in the office of Catalyst, a game production service company.