The wheels are in motion! 2014 was a bit of a roller-coaster for HitPoint. We hit some pretty awesome goals, but faced our fair share of challenges and hardships as well. The upheaval at Microsoft earlier this year, particularly in their gaming division, hit us hard and was a major impetus for our decision to seek new VC funding. Thanks to members of the Western MA investor network River Valley Investors and the Springfield Venture Fund created by MassMutual, as well as other generous investors, we were able to secure enough funding to finish off the majority of our work-for-hire projects and focus the team exclusively on HitPoint-owned games through early 2015. This is both a liberating and challenging position for us to be in, but we’re embracing it with full enthusiasm and determination.
Our Facebook games are doing well and part of the team is heads down on making sure those experiences continue to be enjoyable to our players. If you haven’t checked out Seaside Hideaway, Jane Austen Unbound, Relic Quest, or Fablewood, the latter of which we recently released on iPad, give them a go and let us know what you think.
We have also licensed a mobile game that we developed for DeNA called Hell Marys, which we will be re-releasing this January. The game will be available on Android and iOS devices. The content is definitely a departure from most of the other game genres we’ve worked on, but it has been a great experience for the team to work on something different. While it’s definitely a game for mature audiences only, we’re excited to be tackling new territory and giving it the HitPoint level of polish it deserves. Look out for another post in January when we launch.
The most exciting part of our new focus, which the majority of the team has been working on the past few months, is our “next big thing”. More details will be forthcoming in February when we announce the new product at Casual Connect Europe in Amsterdam, but for now suffice it to say it’s a very ambitious project we think is going to make a big splash in the mobile space next year. We’re all thrilled to be working on it and are doing our best to make it a fantastic user experience.
Finally, with the new year and our new direction come two other big changes for HitPoint. The first is our new logo, which is changing for the first time since HitPoint was founded in 2008. Check out the new hotness in this post’s featured image above, courtesy of one of HitPoint’s amazing artists Steve Forde. Our new branding really captures the playfulness and accessibility of our games while still paying homage to our old-school gaming roots, and we’re really happy for it to be a new way to get the HitPoint name out to the world.
The second major change is our relocation (again!). After just over a year and a half in our current space in Amherst, which we’re all quite fond of, we’ll be moving to a new office space located in the heart of Springfield’s financial district at One Financial Plaza. It’s a fantastic space with an amazing view that you can see somewhat in the photos below, which show our new suite as it is right now, under construction. What’s even more amazing is that all of this construction is happening over the course of just a couple of weeks, and we’re all set to move in this weekend! Thanks to our investors at RVI and MassMutual for making this a reality. Everything is happening very fast, but being able to start the new year in this awesome new space is a great way for us to kick off 2015, which we think will be a huge year for HitPoint. Stay tuned for more announcements as we bring all of these threads together next year to make some amazing products.
Chris Vigorito 