British video-game developer
GLITCHERS |
| Founded | 10 September 2013 |
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| Headquarters | Leith, Edinburgh, Scotland |
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| Founder(s) | Matthew Hyde, Maxwell Scott-Slade, Hugo Scott-Slade |
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| Industry | Indie game design and development |
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| URL | glitchers.com |
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Glitchers is a British video-game company based in Edinburgh, Scotland. It was founded in 2013 by Matthew Hyde, Hugo Scott-Slade, and Maxwell Scott-Slade (of Johnny Two Shoes).[1][2][3]
Glitchers is best known for developing Sea Hero Quest in 2016. The game was developed in collaboration with Alzheimer's Research UK to help dementia research by tracking players' 3D navigation.[4]
The company's name was GLITCHE.RS from 2013 to 2016.[5] It uses the tagline "Games for Good",[6] and aims to "create games that could make a positive impact on the world".[7]
Games
- Plunderland (2010) is an interactive pirate adventure game for iPhone, released initially as part of Johnny Two Shoes but now developed by Glitchers and is available as part of GameClub
- Chippy (2013), a time management game in a simulated fish and chips shop, Chippy was developed as a self-funded app based game and is now available as part of GameClub.[1] Chippy was well received and described by Pocket Gamer as “addictive stuff, and it’s easy to play”.[8]
- Gumulon (2013) is a mobile app based game promoting Stride chewing gum by requiring the player to chew to activate the game.[9]
- Kano is an experimental colour-matching arcade game,[10] which Glitchers explain “was designed primarily as an experiment for us to test out assumptions around player retention, payment models and growth hacking.”[11]
- Sea Hero Quest (2016) is a mobile game which contributes to research on dementia by tracking players' 3D navigation[12] It was designed by Glitchers in association with Alzheimer's Research UK, University College London and the University of East Anglia and with funding from Deutsche Telekom.[13][14][15] The idea for the game came from neuroscientist Michael Hornberger of the University of East Anglia who collaborated with Hugo Spiers of University College London and a group of six other neuroscientists.[16] A new Research Edition was announced in 2021.[17]
- Cone Wars (2017) is an online multiplayer and PC game featuring Ice cream van turf wars[18] in which teams compete to sell the most ice creams using weapons and tactics.
- Nestlums (2020) is a money training app for children, designed to teach good financial habits using familiar gaming techniques, developed in collaboration with Cauldron.[19]
- Crush your FOFO (2018) was developed with the Patients Association and AbbVie to explore patients' "Fear of Finding Out" which leads them to delay seeking medical advice.[20][21][22]
- Drive Buy (2021) is described as a "short-session multiplayer vehicle combat game with a delivery twist" and is available on Steam and Nintendo Switch[23]
In a 2023 blog post marking the 10th anniversary of the company, two forthcoming games were described:[7]
- Forest Guardian will concern rainforest protection
- Enhance, developed with University College London, will be a "spiritual successor" to Sea Hero Quest, "targeted at the 60-80 year old audience Sea Hero Quest couldn’t quite reach".
Awards
In 2018 Sea Hero Quest was nominated for a British Academy Games Awards BAFTA in the category: Game Beyond Entertainment,[24] a new category for games which "deliver a transformational experience beyond pure entertainment".[25] Sea Hero Quest also won bronze in the 2018 The One Show awards.[26]
Also in 2018 Glitchers won a Webby award for Social Impact.[27]
In 2020 Sea Hero Quest was nominated for the Coney Island Dreamland Award for Best AR/VR Game at the New York Game Awards.[28]
In 2022 the company was awarded funding from the UK Games Fund to support the development of Cone Wars.[29][30]
