TinyBuild has acquired the development team behind Hello Neighbor from Dynamic Beasts and announced plans to invest $15 million into the franchise.
It’s unclear how much TinyBuild paid for the team, with the publisher explaining the price was factored into that $15 million investment.
Moving forward, the Hello Neighbor devs will work for TinyBuild under the Eerie Guest Studios banner. The fledgling studio has been established in Hilversum, Netherlands, and will allow TinyBuild to continue strengthening the horror series.
Since launching in 2017, Hello Neighbor has amassed over 40 million downloads on Windows PC, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and mobile platforms. The TinyBuild-published title has also been turned into a TV pilot, and will soon become a board game.
TinyBuild said it wants to keep investing in those cross-media projects while ramping up internal development to capitalize on a market shift driven by COVID-19.
“We are working on more acquisitions to strengthen the brand and investing heavily into cross-media,” says TinyBuild chief exec Alex Nichiporchik. “We just announced Hello Neighbor board game, there’s a graphic novel coming in October, and our internally produced Hello Neighbor Animated Series pilot hit 12 million views on YouTube.”
“During COVID-19 we saw a major spike in free and subscription-based content, showing a trend towards value-driven entertainment. We feel that there’s a big shift coming, so we decided to shift our investments into internal IP development while staying true to our mission of bringing extraordinary value to our fans.”