Ins and Outs: August 2022’s industry hires roundup

Here are the highlights from the recent industry hires and moves, as published in MCV/DEVELOP’s August 2022 issue. 

CAT CHANNON is the new Vice President of Global Corporate Communications at Electronic Arts. Before moving to EA, Cat was working as Director of International Integrated Communications at Warner Bros. Entertainment. She’s also well known for being a legend of UK games journalism, having worked at Future Publishing.

CHARLIE ANDRE-BARRETT, has become Head of Business Development at Curve Games, leaving Team 17. Charlie has worked in the industry for over 20 years, including stints at both Ubisoft and Bethesda. He is also a member of BAFTA.

KRISTIAN VON FERSEN, has also become the new Franchise Director at Curve Games, having worked in the past at companies like Electronic Arts and Relic. He intends to bring his experiences from all facets of game development to Curve, helping them to identify and publish even more exciting titles.

Also joining Curve games is LYNN DANIEL, who has taken on the task of being Director of Public Relations. She previously worked at huge companies like SEGA and Atari, and intends to use her skillset to raise awareness for their roster of indie games and their ongoing success stories.

JON VLASSAOPULOS has joined the Dubit advisory board, after spending time as the VP and Global Head of Music at Roblox. He was part of the team behind creating virtual experiences for the BRITs and the Grammys, and it seems like he intends to continue bringing music to the metaverse in his new role.

JON ROOKE is now the Vice President of Marketing at Thunderful. He used to work at 2K Games as Senior Director of International Marketing and Communications. Rooke has 25 years of experience under his belt, having also worked at THQ, Microsoft and SEGA.

TARA NAZ has become a Producer at Electric Noir Studios. She’s been in the industry for two years, and was previously producing games for Macademia. Tara was also one of the nominees for the Rising Star Award at the Women In Games Awards earlier this year.

REESE WRIGHT has recently joined Devolver Digital as a Senior Producer. Reese has a 16 year career under their belt. The list of previous companies that Reese has worked at includes Robot Teddy, Square Enix and SEGA.

The latest HR Administrator at Sumo Group is JACKSON CRAMP. He’s passionate about building good relationships with people and education, and volunteers in his local community. He sounds like a good fit with the staff at Sumo, and we’re sure he won’t cramp their style. … Sorry Jackson.

KAYLEIGH CARDWELL joins Sumo as a Marketing Graphic Designer, after over eight years designing for various marketing agencies, like the Trident Business Group, Firth Architects and Blush Digital. Before that she spent eleven months working as a Social Media and Community Manager for Lucky6.

Sumo Sheffield has hired DANIEL CASTELLANOS as a Senior Producer, after having worked at Supermassive Games on The Dark Pictures Anthology: The Devil in Me. Before that he was working at Build A Rocket Boy, Big Star Games, A Crowd of Monsters and Digital Legends Entertainment.

VÁCLAV MÜLLER has become a Build Engineer at Sumo Sheffield, having done three years at Madfinger Games in the same role. Before that he spent three years at Micronic as a programmer, which wasn’t video games related at all.

Continuing our list of new hires at Sumo Sheffield is BJORN PRINS, who is joining the team as a Junior Environment Artist. This is Bjorn’s first job in the industry, as he just graduated from the Breda University of Applied Sciences.

AARON SMITH joins Sumo Sheffield as a Senior Programmer, having previously worked on Forza Horizon 4 and 5 at Playground Games and their downloadable content. Hopefully this means Sumo has another racing game in the works, but we won’t hold it against Aaron if not.

ANETTE VAVROVA is the latest Junior 3D Character Artist to join the team at Sumo Sheffield. She graduated from the Breda University of Applied Sciences in 2021, but has been freelancing for a year. We haven’t asked her, but having done freelance work ourselves, we know that she is absolutely looking forward to not having to invoice anymore.

Finishing up our Sumo Sheffield list for this edition of MCV/DEVELOP is OSCAR BIGGS, who joins Sumo Sheffield as a Producer following time spent at Automaton Games and Frontier Developments. Oscar also used to work at a GameStop in Wisconsin.

FRANCISCO NICOLAU is now a Programmer at Red Kite Games, in what is their first games industry role. They have a BSc and MSc in Computer Science and Engineering IST from Lisbon University, and have won several competitions.

LAB42 Games has hired LUKE VILJOEN as a Senior Concept Artist. Their career started in 2009, so they’ve been at this for a while. Luke previously worked at Team17, 2K Australia, Tasty Poison Games, as well as having done time as a freelancer.

CARINA SOFIA OLIVEIRA SOARES has become a Junior Environment Artist at Lab42 Games. She was initially a contractor, but impressed the team so much that they hired her as a full time staff member. Alongside freelancing, she used to teach online classes in 3D art.

EUGENE CHERNY is an audio programmer at Sumo Nottingham now, having moved to the UK from all the way over in China. He is interested in both art and academia, having dabbled a little bit in both professionally in the past.

JUAN SEBASTIAN MUGURUZA has become a Technical Director at Sumo Nottingham, in his latest games industry role. He initially started out in the industry as a gameplay programmer but shifted tracks as he loves character-driven gameplay, mechanics and systems.

MAREK BERKA is Sumo Nottingham’s newest Project Design Director. He has worked on some big names since the start of his career in 2003, including Mafia II at Illusion Softworks, and Silent Hill: Downpour at Vatra Games. Most recently he worked on Chorus for Deep Silver.

HERNAN BORQUEZ POLLONI will be designing the look of user interfaces at Sumo Nottingham as a Senior UI Artist. While he’s told us he considers himself a graphic designer, he has over 15 years of industry experience including previous roles as Senior UI Artist, Creative Director and Art Director.

PAUL HOLLYWOOD is the new Development Director at Sumo Leamington. He’s worked in the industry since the days of the Commodore Amiga. He was part of the team that worked on the pilot sim F-29 Retaliator. He is also known as one of the people behind Sony’s MotorStorm racing franchise on PS3.

ARRAN BLOMFIELD is Sumo Leamington’s new Senior Producer, and joins the team after having worked as a producer on mobile, VR and AAA games at companies including Creative Assembly, Square Enix and Pixel Toys. He also has a Master’s Degree in Gameplay Design and Production from Staffordshire University.

ASMITE CHAKRABORTY is a Technical UI Designer that has joined the team at Sumo Leamington. She comes to the games industry for the first time following four years working with the international professional services brand PwC, so this new role must feel quite different.

GARETH SLEVIN-BROWN is Secret Mode’s new QA Technician, who has joined the team after a year as a NHS Operations Centre Action Manager and six months as a Temporary QA Technician at Codemasters. They also have a Masters in Manufacturing Engineering from Coventry University.

MARY UDOFIA is the new Community Coordinator at Secret Mode. She joins the team having worked in events for the games industry such as EGX. Mary also spent some time as a full-time content creator, so she’s experienced in community-building and bonding with an audience.

ADAM MEREDITH is now a Senior UE Programmer at The Chinese Room. He has worked in the industry for over 10 years, having previously worked on console games for d3t, Team17 and Zoe Mode. He also has a BSc. (Hons) in from Abertay University.

Lastly, SEBASTIEN TOTTÉ is the new Senior Country Manager at Xsolla UK. He comes to the company after seven years at Meta. Now that he’s there, he will be responsible for reaching out to the European games industry and helping to further grow the scope and scale of Xsolla UK.