Another AAA studio made up of former Playground Games staff has been formed

Lighthouse Games is led by the Forza Horizon studio’s co-founder Gavin Raeburn

Playground Games co-founder Gavin Raeburn has launched a new triple-A game studio.

UK studio Lighthouse Games will be based in Leamington Spa, the same town where Playground Games is located.

The team is currently working on an as-yet unannounced triple-A game featuring a brand new IP.

Raeburn co-founded Playground Games with Trevor Williams and Ralph Fulton in 2010. The studio would go on to develop all five games in the Forza Horizon series, the first of which was directed by Raeburn.

He then left Playground in January 2022 with Williams taking over his studio director role.

In a statement, Raeburn said: “I’m delighted that 30 former colleagues and other industry heavyweights have chosen to join me at Lighthouse.

“With Horizon, Playground and I created one of the most successful Xbox franchises of all time. We delivered significant commercial success year after year, to massive critical acclaim, following the success from my time at Codemasters leading Dirt, Grid and F1.

“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.”

Lighthouse Games is the second triple-A studio to be put together by former Playground staff this year.

In January it was announced that some of the key talent behind the Forza Horizon series had left Playground to form a new triple-A development studio called Maverick Games.

Also based in Leamington Spa, Maverick’s founding team is led by former Forza Horizon creative director Mike Brown, who’s serving as its creative director and studio head.