Turtle Rock Studios is an American video game developer founded in March 2002 by Michael Booth, and was acquired by Valve Corporation in 2008. In 2009, Turtle Rock went independent and was re-founded by Chris Ashton and Phil Robb. Turtle Rock Studios is involved in the creation of original titles as well as the provision of consulting services to the digital entertainment industry.
History[]
On November 20, 2006, Turtle Rock Studios announced Left 4 Dead, a co-operative multiplayer action game. The game was built atop the most advanced version of the Source Engine available at the time and introduced version 2 of Turtle Rock's AI technology, which had since been updated from the AI used for the bots in Condition Zero. The game released on Microsoft Windows and the Xbox 360 in November 2008.
On 10 January 2008, Valve Corporation announced that they had acquired Turtle Rock Studios.[2] Valve took control of development since then. Later in 2008, Valve shut down Turtle Rock Studios and let all the personnel relocate to Seattle to join them if they wanted to. On 3 June 2009, Doug Lombardi of Valve Corporation confirmed that the studio was no longer operating as Valve South some time after the release of Left 4 Dead. After formally being closed the remaining team members developed an iPhone automotive maintenance app named Garage Buddy and on 5 February 2010, Turtle Rock Studios put up a new website declaring they have reformed and are once again working on video games. On 2 June 2010, Turtle Rock Studios announced the formation of a new division in Turtle Rock called Turtle Rock Garage, a small division based solely on casual games. On 22 September 2010, Digital Development Management announced they are representing Turtle Rock Studios to find publishers for their games.
On 9 February 2011, Turtle Rock Studios announced they have begun aggressive hiring for their next major title. On 26 May 2011, THQ announced they would be publishing Turtle Rock's next major title. On 10 June 2011, THQ described Turtle Rock's next title as 'Wild'. THQ core game boss Danny Bilson confirmed that a full reveal of the shooter is due. On 20 October 2011, Turtle Rock confirmed that their next title will be powered by CryEngine 3. On 23 January 2013, Take-Two Interactive acquired the rights to the current game, listed as Evolve, in the THQ Bankruptcy Auction, with subsidiary 2K Games to publish the game.
List of Games[]
Turtle Rock Studios is best known for their work on Valve Corporation's Counter-Strike and Left 4 Dead franchises. Works include:
Developed[]
- Counter-Strike: Condition Zero, including the Official Counter-Strike Bot
- Various maps for Counter-Strike: Source
- A map named "Halls3" which was eventually included in Half-Life 2: Deathmatch
- Left 4 Dead
- Survival Pack DLC (Developed by Valve Software)
- Crash Course DLC (Developed by Valve Software)
- Left 4 Dead 2 (Developed by Valve Software)
- The Passing DLC
- Left 4 Dead / Left 4 Dead 2: The Sacrifice[12]
- Leap Sheep! (iOS & Android)
- Evolve
Ported[]
- Counter-Strike (Xbox)