Rockstar Games has reportedly bought developer Ruffian Games, the team behind the game Crackdown 2. The news comes from a new report by The Gamer and has since been verified by Video Games Chronicle (VGC). According to the former who said it can report the purchase, Ruffian Games was obtained and has now been rebranded as Rockstar Dundee.
According to The Gamer, Rockstar Dundee has been assisting with the development of “unspecified titles” for Rockstar’s games since 2019, when the company was looking for engineers. The studio started a similar hiring spree in August 2020, with all positions focusing on “projects with our partner Rockstar Games.” There’s no word on what these projects are. Rockstar Dundee is listed on the company’s career page and was noticed by a keen-eyed Twitter user last month, but the tweet went unnoticed:
Rockstar Dundee pic.twitter.com/1ow6gQapxw
— Conor (@ConorGamingzHD) September 28, 2020
Last year (2019), Ruffian Games announced it would be working with Rockstar Games on numerous upcoming titles, which many assumed would be a Red Dead Redemption remaster following the company’s work on Halo: The Master Chief Collection. However, Rockstar Games announced earlier this year that GTA V will be coming to next-gen systems, suggesting it could be assisting on porting the game instead.
We’re #Hiring! https://t.co/W5YqjZODIJ
— Ruffian Games (@RuffianGames) October 11, 2019
The job listing on the company’s site stated that it was looking for developers to help create “generalised experience in multiplayer action games developed for PC, Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and future platforms”. It added that “it’s now working closely with Rockstar on upcoming titles,” and that “given Rockstar’s portfolio, it should be reasonably simple to make an educated guess or two”
Since Ruffian has previous experience recreating old favourites with The Master Chief Collection, only time will say whether the studio will apply that same magic to some Rockstar classics, such as the original Red Dead Redemption.
