Krafton – BIG

South Korea-based PUBG publisher Krafton has opened its first Canadian studio in Montreal.

The appropriately named Krafton Montreal is working on a game based on the Korean fantasy novel, The Bird That Drinks Tears.

Krafton Montreal will be led by Patrik Méthé, a Ubisoft Montreal veteran who co-directed Far Cry 3, 4 and 5. The team is currently made up of 15 people but aims to grow up to 150 over the next three years. Some of the other former Ubisoft staff that Méthé has brought with him so far include game director Frédéric Duroc (Prince of Persia), producer Benoit Frappier (Rainbow Six) and technology director Martin Paradis (Assassin’s Creed).

It’s not yet clear what type of game the untitled project will end up being, as the team is still in the early stages, Méthé told GamesIndustry.biz. However, it’s confirmed to be a single-player title.

Interestingly, Méthé also told the publication that he was “very, very involved” in the tabletop RPG space, at one point even owning his own store selling Dungeons and Dragons products. Therefore, the project may draw inspiration from such IPs.

Méthé was brought onto Krafton in October 2022, and since then has been looking for a dedicated office space for the team. It remains to be seen where Krafton Montreal will ultimately set up shop.

Regardless, Krafton is the latest in an ever-growing list of studios to expand into Montreal. With nearly 20,000 workers across 200-plus studios, the city is one of the top five biggest game development hubs in the world, per the economic development agency Montreal International. Lucrative tax incentives and a deep pool of developer talent have made the city a particularly appealing hub for the gaming industry.

Some of the major publishers in Montreal include the aforementioned Ubisoft, Warner Bros. (Gotham Knights), Eidos (Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy), EA Motive (the recent Dead Space remake) and Behaviour Interactive (Dead by Daylight).

Collectively, they’ve helped Canada as a whole become the third-largest producer of games in the world, behind only the U.S. and Japan. In total, the national games sector contributes $5.5 billion to Canada’s GDP annually.

Krafton, meanwhile, has two other studios in North America: the California-based teams Striking Distance (the recent Callisto Protocol) and Unknown Worlds Entertainment (Subnautica).

Image credit: Krafton

Krafton, the company behind the popular PUBG battle royale game, has unveiled a “virtual human” named Ana.

The goal behind the “hyper-realistic” avatar is to “help establish” Krafton’s web3 ecosystem. Interestingly, Ana was created using Unreal, the development engine owned by Epic Games, the maker of PUBG rival Fortnite. While the companies have had legal disputes in the past, it makes sense that Krafton would want to use Unreal, given its ubiquity and, specifically, its tool for creating realistic digital characters.

Krafton says Ana features “highly-advanced face rigging technology” that “delicately expresses the movement of the pupil, fine facial muscles and wrinkles, and enables the natural joint movement across the entire body.” Meanwhile, “deep learning technologies” like “advanced voice synthesis” have been used to “create an artificial intelligent voice for ANA so she can act and sing just like a real human.”

It’s unclear exactly how Ana will be used by Krafton for web3 purposes, although it’s easy to see how it may be leveraged for promoting blockchain and NFT-related efforts. In a press statement, Krafton simply said it expects Ana to “attract the interest and popularity of Gen Z around the world,” which it will do, in part, through an “original music track” and other influencer activity across the field of entertainment.

While many gamers probably don’t care about any of this and just want to actually play games, Krafton is also, thankfully, working on a new title. Once planned to be set in the PUBG universe, Krafton’s The Callisto Protocol, a new survival horror game from the creators of Dead Space, will release on PlayStation 4/5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S and PC on December 2nd, 2022.

Source: Krafton