Riot Games Acquires Wargaming Sydney Studio to Accelerate Development of Live Games

• The studio will be renamed Riot Sydney and will continue to operate out of the team’s current office.
• The studio is known for its expertise in live service games and networking technology, having previously supported the development of innovative features for Wargaming products.

LOS ANGELES AND SYDNEY – Riot Games, the game developer and publisher best known for League of Legends, today completed its acquisition of Wargaming Sydney studio. The studio will be renamed Riot Sydney and is a global development powerhouse with experience creating next-generation game development tools and servers, world-leading games, and some R&D projects — as well as prototypes for new game features, add-ons, and console ports.

“We are really excited to bring these talented developers and teams to Riot,” said Marc Merrill, Co-Founder, and President of Games. “The Rioters that have had the opportunity to work with members of the Sydney team are confident not only in the tech they’ve built over the years but, more importantly, in the people who’ve built it. Naz (Naresh Hirani, Head of Development, Riot Sydney) and the dev teams at the studio have a long history of working in ways that will complement Riot’s ability to deliver value to our players and we really look forward to collaborating with them.”

The newly established Riot Sydney will use their considerable expertise to further augment the League of Legends, VALORANT, and tech teams at Riot. The studio will be a key contributor to Riot’s Development Studios organization under industry veteran and Riot’s Head of Development Studios, Molly Mason-Boule. Under Molly’s leadership, Riot is expanding its approach to global development, and over time, Riot is looking forward to growing the game industry in Australia and will also continue to explore similar opportunities to add expert talent from veteran studios.

“Being part of Wargaming has been a phenomenal journey for us over the last 10 years, and it’s helped our studio grow and thrive,” said Naz. “We were really impressed by the cultural fit we’ve experienced in our dealings with everyone at Riot, and we can’t wait to bring our expertise in global development to the respective teams. I know I speak for the whole team when I say how excited we all are to become part of Riot and help deliver amazing experiences to players.”

The studio is one of the largest development studios in Australia and has worked on World of Tanks, World of Warships, and many more titles across console and PC. The studio’s award-winning tech, Bigworld Technology, was the catalyst for becoming part of Wargaming in 2012. Before this, Bigworld Technology was powering 30+ MMO’s and online games and also held the Guinness World Record for Most Players Online Simultaneously on one MMO Server. Wargaming will maintain ownership of and continue the use of Bigworld Technology for their products.

The acquisition comes 10 years after Bigworld joined Wargaming and helped the studio create some of the world’s most popular games. The studio has over 25 years of gaming experience in Australia and has proven to be one of the most innovative teams in the region and industry. 

The studio’s entire development staff will join Riot Sydney, while the existing publishing team will remain a part of Wargaming.

For more information, visit www.riotgames.com.