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| Formerly | FreeStyleGames Limited (2002–2017) |
|---|---|
| Company type | Subsidiary |
| Industry | Video games |
| Founded | 29 November 2002; 22 years ago (2002-11-29) inWarwick, England |
| Founders |
|
| Defunct | 1 April 2025; 7 months ago (2025-04-01) |
| Headquarters | , England |
Key people | Lisa Opie (managing director) |
| Products | |
Number of employees | 50 (2016) |
| Parent |
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| Website | leamington |
Ubisoft Leamington (formerlyFreeStyleGames Limited) was a Britishvideo game developer and a studio ofUbisoft based inLeamington Spa. Founded in November 2002 by six industry veterans formerly ofCodemasters andRare, the studio was bought byActivision in September 2008. In January 2017, Ubisoft acquired the studio from Activision and renamed it Ubisoft Leamington. Ubisoft Leamington worked onAAA games in a supporting capacity, primarily theTom Clancy's The Division franchise, in close cooperation with sister studioUbisoft Reflections.
In January 2025, Ubisoft announced a series of layoffs that would ultimately affect the Leamington studio, which officially shutdown after a consultation process on 1 April 2025.
FreeStyleGames was founded on 29 November 2002 by Alex Darby, David Osbourn, Phil Hindle and Jamie Jackson, formerly ofCodemasters, and Alex Zoro and Jonny Ambrose, formerly ofRare.
Their first title,B-Boy, a game of competitivebreak-dancing, was published and distributed bySony Computer Entertainment Europe in Europe in 2006, and published by Evolved Games and distributed bySouthPeak Games in North America in 2008.[1]B-Boy featuresCrazy Legs of theRock Steady Crew, as well as many other well knownb-boys from around the World. It won theIGN best ofE3 2006 award for bestPSP music game.[2]
On 12 September 2008, FreeStyleGames was purchased byActivision for an undisclosed sum, following a period of commercial cooperation, mainly involving localiseddownloadable content for theGuitar Hero series.[3]
The first game the company developed under Activision's ownership wasDJ Hero (2009), a spin-off of theGuitar Hero series, in which players used a turntable-based controller to mimic the actions of adisc jockey across numerous songs.[4] The title was considered successful, and they completedDJ Hero 2 the following year, though around that time, therhythm game genre was suffering from a glut of releases and was in decline, and Activision had decided to end further production of anyGuitar Hero title. The company had to lay off some employees during this time, but still were financially viable with success ofSing Party (2012) on theWii U, which was a collaborative effort withNintendo.[5] AsSing Party's development was wrapping up, Activision approached FreeStyleGames to have them consider how to reboot theGuitar Hero franchise. FreeStyleGames developed a new guitar controller atypical of ones that has been created to that point, and crafted a different approach towards presenting the game to players through a first-person perspectivefull-motion video. This work culminated inGuitar Hero Live (2015), the first newGuitar Hero title for theeighth generation of video game consoles.[5]
WhileGuitar Hero Live was praised by critics, it failed to have significant sales, falling short of Activision's projections.[6] On 1 April 2016, it was announced that around 50 staff were made redundant as part of a reshuffle by Activision.[7] Founders Jackson and Osbourn opted to leave the studio at that point, disappointed in how development studios are treated when games are not financially successful, and along with two of the laid-off staff, Jonathan Napier and Gareth Morrison, formed a new studio,Slingshot Cartel. This studio anticipates developing games in a process more akin to filmmaking, something that the studio had to do during the course of development ofGuitar Hero Live, which they seem can better streamline the process and reduce costs for game production.[8]
On 18 January 2017, French publisherUbisoft acquired the studio from Activision, and renamed it Ubisoft Leamington, referencing itsLeamington Spa location. Under this new owner, Ubisoft Leamington worked closely withNewcastle-upon-Tyne-based partner studioUbisoft Reflections, another studio acquired by Ubisoft and rebranded.[9]
A proposal to close the studio as part of ongoing cost-cutting measures was announced on 27 January 2025.[10] The studio officially closed its doors on 1 April 2025 following the conclusion of the consultation process, with staff not affected moving to fully remote contracts.[11]
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