Rumors are swirling that 10tacle, one of Europe’s fastest growing developers, is still looking to expand through Europe, building more development studios to work on their internal and licensed projects. With studios already existing in Hannover (Germany), Bratislava (Slovakia), Charleroi (Belgium), Singapore and London and 10tacle being a German-based company, the search began for clues to where in Europe 10tacle would expand. Well, a handful of Google searches later brought about the answer. Vienna, Austria, once home to Rockstar Vienna, at one point one of the largest development studios in Europe and shutdown last year by parent company Take 2.

During this handy dandy Google search, we came upon http://www.10t-vienna.com/, what appears to be the landing page for the forthcoming 10tacle Vienna. Some questions remain. Like what exactly would 10tacle Vienna be doing? If development, what projects and what platforms are they looking to target? Vienna has an abundance of console and handheld development talent thanks to the Rockstar fallout, however, what talent would back 10tacle Vienna? Vienna’s (best and) most experienced developers have already been snatched up, with the creation of Team Vienna and Games That Matter, two new studios both formed by former high-level management from Rockstar Vienna, and the small successes of smaller local independent developers such as Xendex, Sproing, Greentube and last but not least, JoWooD, who all have been recruiting lately. There is little to no studio management-level experience left in Vienna, which means 10tacle would (hopefully) bring in external studio management and begin recruiting locally in Vienna by targeting the staff of other studios, which could be a risk for 10tacle’s local image if developers begin shifting companies.

Whatever the case, if it’s true, great for Vienna, Austria, a wonderful city with a tight little game development community who could really use new blood in the scene.

Update 1: Have now heard that the studio will focus primarily on production of 10tacle projects developed elsewhere. Snore. Also, it’s teamvienna.at not teamvienna.org.

Hmm?: 10tacle Vienna | 10tacle