Gavin Raeburn, studio head for Forza Horizon developer Playground Games, has formed a new studio dubbed Lighthouse Games.
The formation of Lighthouse comes over a full year after Raeburn left the studio he helped co-found with Trevor Williams and Ralph Fulton back in 2010. Before Playground, he worked on Codemasters’ Grid series, along with cult classics such as Commodore 64’s The Equalizer.
Interestingly, the announcement of Lighthouse comes a few months after the reveal of another developer, Maverick Games. Maverick was founded by Playground veterans such as Forza Horizon 5’s creative director Mike Brown and its senior producer Tom Butcher.
Per the press release, Lighthouse features 30 employees and is at work on a new and unannounced triple-A property. It’ll be operating in Leamington Spa, the same town where Playground is currently stationed.
“With [Forza] Horizon, Playground and I created one of the most successful Xbox franchises of all time. We delivered significant commercial success year after year,” wrote Raeburn. “That DNA is now at Lighthouse, and with it, we intend to build something truly special using all our experience to create a new genre-defining franchise.”