PTW, a support studio with credits on Exoprimal and Mortal Kombat 1, has founded its fifth American office over in Charleston, South Carolina.
The opening of the new studio, which makes PTW the first game development services company in the city, is expected to be a “pivotal moment” for the city’s game dev community. In its announcement, PTW explained how it hopes to create hundreds of local jobs over the next several years as it “leverages Charleston’s vibrant tech ecosystem and the wealth of local talent it harbors.”
PTW Charleston will be headed up by Bernhard Rieder, who will report to American operations VP Sebastien Bisch. In the announcement, Bisch underlined the importance of having “having a domestic QA solution to better serve our US-based partners. […] We’re excited to create a center of excellence for the industry within the vibrant Charleston community, and we look forward to building a new flagship studio in the US.”
PTW’s year of tech and geographic expansion
Like other studios throughout 2024, PTW has seen its fair share of ups and downs. At the top of the year, it laid off 45 developers across its global teams. Those have been the company’s only reductions in a year otherwise filled with expansions and acquisitions.
Back in May, PTW opened a mocap studio in London, which built on its previous relationship with Imaginarium Studios. The studio was set up to offer simultaneous full-body capture and voice recording, a service that PTW says isn’t standard for a mocap building. More recently, its $13 million acquisition of co-development studio Ghostpunch in August. That deal, which finalized earlier this week, will allow PTW to provide AI-powered services to its clients relating to art technology and integration, and QA automation.