Atari has announced that it will acquire a majority stake in SteamWorld publisher Thunderful, and the latter has also revealed that its CEO will be stepping down as soon as a successor is found.
According to an Atari press release, the company will be acquiring 82% of Thunderful’s shares, a move CEO Wade Rosen describes as “another important milestone in Atari’s development” and a big part of the expansion of Atari’s “publishing and development capabilities in the European region”.
In a separate press release of its own, Thunderful says that it will be undergoing a restructuring operation that will result in layoffs across the studio, with recent release Lost in Random: The Eternal Die selling less than Thunderful had hoped in its second quarter of the year.
Despite the restructuring, Thunderful says its upcoming slate remains the same, although the studio says it has been “overly dependent on individual game releases” in recent years. It’s not entirely clear how the studio intends to pivot away from that reliance, however.
One thing that will be changing as part of Thunderful’s restructuring is its CEO. Per another press release, current CEO Martin Walfisz will be departing the company, but he’ll be remaining in his position “until a new CEO has assumed the role”.
He will, however, not be remaining beyond December 31st this year at the latest, so we can assume that Thunderful will have found itself another CEO by then.
Atari’s investment in Thunderful follows a challenging year and a half for the studio. In January last year, Thunderful laid off around 20% of its workforce, and it followed that decision with the closure of Stage Clear Studios last May and yet more staff cuts in November.
Atari, meanwhile, has been on something of an acquisition spree in the last couple of years. In 2024, the company acquired its erstwhile rival Intellivision, as well as the Surgeon Simulator IP through its newly-revived Infogrames label.
We’ll have to wait and see what its majority stake in Thunderful yields for the latter, but it’s unlikely that the SteamWorld studio will continue without some major internal policy shake-ups. Stay tuned for more.
