Double Feature: Milestones 2013 & 2012
Milestone 2013: A digital label in an invented language… that works?
This week #15YearsOfKalypso looks back on the 2013 and 2012 milestones and it’s all about the establishment, development and growth. What do we mean by that? Kalypso Media was founded in 2006 – that’s true – but the years 2013 and 2012 brought lots of innovations. Not least through the founding of Kalypso Media’s digital label Kasedo Games.
In our milestone for 2016, Kasedo’s PR, Marketing and Product Manager Patrick Cahill already shared a bit of the inside scoop. Now, for the actual genesis of Kasedo Games in 2013, Kalypso Media founder and CEO Simon Hellwig himself has shared some memories!
Kalypso Media’s Digital Label was founded in 2013 to support indie studios with the digital distribution of their titles. While Kalypso focused on full-price titles, our digital label was able to successfully cover the games in the mid-price segment.
At first only on a trial basis, but then with increasingly greater success, the digital label established itself little by little with titles such as Crowntakers, Rise of Industry, and most recently with their biggest success to date, Warhammer 40,000: Mechanicus.
Fun Fact: The name Kasedo Games didn’t officially come into existence until 2019/2020… unofficially however much earlier. “Kasedo” means cassette. Not in an ordinary language, but in the planned language Esperanto! Bonus fact: Even books (the Bible) and programs (Firefox, Open Office) exist in Esperanto and still up to 2 million people worldwide speak the artificially created language – which was created as a second language for international communication. What could be more fitting for a company that publishes games with the ability to connect players all over the world?
The next big hit of Kasedo Games is already waiting in the wings, as City of Gangsters lets you build your own crime syndicate in 1920s Prohibition USA. Players will build speakeasies and illegal distilleries and manage production chains in the hope of making a buck or two from the sale of illicit liquor. But keep an eye on your turf, your enemies and the cops.
An introductory series of short videos to City of Gangsters can be found here.
Milestone 2012: Girl Power and Quality Assurance
The years that kept on giving don’t end with 2013, though. In our #15YearsOfKalypso retrospective, you’ll find that the origins of our current Customer Communications department can be found in 2012 – seriously!
The Head of this department is Dr Bettina Albert, who started at Kalypso Media as an intern in 2012 and got her own standalone position soon after. For the first time, there was one person responsible for all our social media channels. From that point on, our communication with you evolved and grew – through the initially separate departments of Social Media, Support and Community Management to the current Customer Communications department, which unites all three areas. With a team of 6 permanent employees and rotating interns, Head of Customer Communications Dr Bettina Albert is fully prepared to answer your questions and provide feedback.
Bonus Fact: All our communications teams – PR, Marketing and Customer Communications – work closely together and are led by a female powerhouse: International Marketing Director Dr Anika Thun.
But 2012 had even more in store, because the massive expansion of our QA department began, which back then only consisted of one person. Now, we at Kalypso Media are happy about a QA team of 7 permanent employees, who are actively supported by interns and look after our and your games with a lot of love, playtesting, and diligence, as well as managing the communication with our external QA testers.
By expanding our QA department, we are also no longer solely dependent on external providers, but can vouch for a high level of quality in our games ourselves and have thus created another important building block for the expansion of our Games as a Service philosophy!
Have you missed any milestones, want to reread them or are waiting for the next ones? Keep an eye on the 15 Years of Kalypso Media category here on our blog and our social media channels! There you’ll find not only milestones but also fun facts, everything about Kalypso Media, our studios and our games.