Gravity Bear unveils its first social fighting game on Facebook

Game startup Gravity Bear is unveiling its first original game for Facebook today. Battle Punks is a “3-D social game” that will debut this holiday season.

The game is set in a variety of fantasy locations, combining in-depth game design with social networking. As such, it’s one of a new generation of Facebook games that aims to deliver a better experience than the simpler two-dimensional games such as FarmVille that dominate Facebook today. Players create avatars and enter them into combat against others in a bid to become the scrappiest fighter in a kingdom.

Emeryville, Calif.-based Gravity Bear, which came out of stealth mode last month, will likely get some attention because social gaming is so hot. Last week, the leaders in the market made a lot of news. Electronic Arts bought social gaming firm Playfish for as much as $400 million; Playdom raised $43 million in venture capital, while market leader Zynga raised $15 million. Even though these hot companies are growing fast, the Facebook market can still accommodate new entrants. Crowdstar, for instance, managed to score big with its Happy Aquarium game, which has 27 million users.

In the game, players battle their way through towns, forests, swamps and more. The character creation tool is advanced enough that players can create one-of-a-kind characters. In battles, players can win weapons, spells, experience points, and treasure. But the company is making a bet that its 3-D graphics will dazzle users, who are more accustomed to lame but fast graphics on the social network.

The game will debut with analytics technology from SQLstream, which measures activity in an app and will allow Gravity Bear to tweak the game to suit the tastes of users.

The company was founded in 2008 by Phil Shenk, one of the many game veterans who came from the diaspora of Flagship Studios, a San Jose, Calif.-based game studio which imploded a year ago. Veterans from Flagship went on to form Runic Games, which we chronicled today, and they joined Cryptic Studios to work on Star Trek Online. Gravity Bear has six employees.

Gravity Bear announces debut title Battle Punks

New Social Games Company Blasts Out of Hibernation to Deliver Unique Social Gaming Experience

Emeryville, California – November 18, 2009 – Gravity Bear, a new breed of social games company, announced today its debut title, Battle Punks, an original game application built for the Facebook® Platform. Primed to launch this holiday season, Battle Punks is the first 3D social game of its kind.  Set against a vibrant tableau of fantasy locations, it combines stellar game design with the latest in social networking technology. Players will take their custom-created avatars on a heroic journey, proving themselves in boisterous combat against millions of other avatars in a bid to become the toughest, scrappiest fighter in the kingdom.

Battle Punks delivers a raucous journey where players tromp and battle their way through festive towns, shadowy forests, gloomy swamps, and beyond. Using an advanced character creation tool, players craft one-of-a-kind personas, then throw-down against anyone in the Battle Punks community, in order to win prized weapons, spells, experience and treasure. Strategically outfitting their characters before each fray, players choose from their armory of collected Battle Items, in order to give their dauntless champion the best tools for the job.

“Our goal with Battle Punks is to help people have fun and deeply memorable experiences with their friends through games”, said Phil Shenk, Co-Founder and CEO of Gravity Bear, “This is the primary mission of Gravity Bear, so our first title is designed from the ground up to be a shining example of that philosophy of community and fun. We can’t wait to build a new community of people who simply love games as much as we do.”

In Battle Punks, players can test their mettle in a beautifully realized world unlike anything currently available on social networks. Using a sophisticated 3D engine to render both characters and environments, the Battle Punks Universe is filled with colorful environments, towns and characters. Battle Punks introduces a bold new look to the exploding world of social gaming.

Helping optimize the game experience behind the scenes are the innovative technologies from strategic partner SQLstream. Their application allows developers to monitor and analyze metrics in real-time, which will be a huge benefit to the deployment and growth of Battle Punks. With SQLstream’s tools in their arsenal, Gravity Bear has the power to connect with gamers as never before.  With the explosive growth of the social games space, Battle Punks is uniquely positioned to bring something new and unique to all kinds of gamers– casual, hardcore or anywhere in between.

Developed by Gravity Bear, Battle Punks is currently scheduled to enter open beta during the 2009 holiday season on the Facebook Platform.

For more information on Gravity Bear, please visit: http://www.gravitybear.com/

For more information on Battle Punks, please visit: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Gravity-Bear/89961808421

Hey all!  Our weekly “Where O Where is Gravity Bear?” contest has been kicked off!

You can cast your vote on our Facebook fanpage.    Click Here to vote now!

A new contest will go up every Wednesday at 9am PST.  A new photo will be revealed very day until someone gets the correct answer!  Good lucks!!  =D

Where is Gravity Bear?

Hi everyone! Its contest time!!! Our first contest is The Thanksgiving Logo Contest.

The rules are simple: Design a Thanksgiving Day version of the Gravity Bear logo! Be as creative as you want…Post all entries on our wall, and add to the Thanksgiving Logo Contest album. You can use either logo… Safe for work entri…es only please!

Winner will get the logo posted on our website and our Facebook Page,
get their name and logo featured on our website, and will get early
access to our closed beta.

1st and 2nd runners up will get a mention on our website (as runners up) and will get early access to our closed beta.

Fans are encouraged to comment and like the entries that they love!

Contest will end on Thursday November 19th at 11:59pm PST.

Final winners will be announced on Monday November 23rd at 6:00pm PST.

See our facebook page for more details and to see all the latest entries!

A Look at Who’s New in Social Gaming: Gravity Bear

Michael Mullen, Managing Editor at AOL Game Daily, has great coverage of recent Gravity Bear events. You can read the below or the original story at:

blog.games.com/2009/10/27/gravity-bear-dips-into-social-gaming/

Gravity Bear Dips into Social Gaming

Gravity Bear isn’t shy about its intentions to claw into the projected $1 billion in 2009 social networking game realm, currently dominated by Zynga, Playfish and Playdom but it’s sure being coy about just how they’ll win. But Gravity Bear’s teeth are sharpened by Phil Shenk, a video game industry art and design vet with stints as art director at Flagship Studios, lead artist on Blizzard’s Diablo 2 and spend time helping Microsoft, Sony and others to create online casual games on Wild Tangent.

While the details around Gravity Bear’s first game are still a secret, we decided to ask Phil Sheck, co-founder and CEO about his company and the reasons for jumping into the social gaming realm. Shenk was actually kind enough to answer:

Games.com: Is the focus here casual games, casual games on social networks, or social network games?

Shenk: Our focus is on making the kinds of games that we think will do well on social networks. Casual games is a pretty broad market, and I’ve heard people in the industry define that genre as very light, often puzzle style games. For social games, historically they’ve focused heavily on asynchronous play, light competition, personal expression, etc., which of course makes sense given the platform and how viral distribution works.

Our goal is to push the bar higher, and provide a more compelling, more immersive experience. It’s delicate work, because there are unique parameters to consider: leveraging social connections, providing opportunities for fun self-expression, the right balance of competition (it has to build community, not divide it), being mindful of the time people have to spend during the day, etc. But I strongly believe that there are myriad opportunities to make games more compelling, more engaging, and with more long-term experiences.Games.com: While you’re the known heavy on this and have art in your professional history, is it safe to say that art might be the major hook for Gravity Bear?

Shenk: A lot of my positions have been art-related, at least the high-profile ones like Diablo 2, and I care passionately about the way art, sound and music are presented in a game. I’m certainly able to communicate visually, so I take advantage of that when I can. That said, I’ve actually been more involved with design and management for the past six years or so. After Blizzard, I was a Studio Director at Wild Tangent, which was pretty operationally focused, and also a lot of bus dev. As one of the co-founders at Flagship, it was largely management and design, and then helping out as Creative Director on Mythos. Given my background it was natural that I served as Art Director, but we had a strong team lead, Lee Dotson, and he basically held the fort on art for Hellgate, especially in the later half of the project. Flagship was a great opportunity, and I didn’t want to pass up a chance to work with the fantastic team that I’d had such a long history with; but at the same time, if Flagship had never happened, I was already looking at striking out on my own. Gravity Bear is focused on the whole experience, the presentation. It’s safe to say that that’s one of the major areas where we’re pushing the envelope, as well as game design, and rich community features.

Games.com: Going after Zynga/Playfish/Playdom won’t be easy to win, what makes Gravity Bear potentially better than the competition?

Shenk: I think it’s up to us to execute basically. We have a strong pedigree in all aspects of game development, from both a [video game] developer and a [video game] publisher perspective. For example, when my business partner Aletheia worked at Sony, she saw virtually every PlayStation game cross her desk. That experience has honed her phenomenal sense of what works and what doesn’t. We have a good plan, and we’ve done our homework. I have a lot of respect for those companies you mentioned, and while the space is competitive, it’s also shown that there is a huge and growing market that responds very favorably to quality and innovation… that’s our mission.

GRAVITY BEAR AND SQLSTREAM ANNOUNCE STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP

Partnership Will Enable New Social Game Company Gravity Bear to build responsive Online Games Using SQLstream’s Real-Time Analytics & Monitoring Technology

Emeryville, California – October 29, 2009 – Gravity Bear and SQLstream today announced a partnership to bring cutting edge real-time analytic technologies to games for social networks. Established to create a new breed of social games, Gravity Bear is poised to create engaging, original content for social gaming platforms. The relationship marks a significant point of convergence for the interactive entertainment and the enterprise software industries.

SQLstream is the first company to provide real-time monitoring and business intelligence using the ISO standard SQL language. Bridging the gap between operational intelligence systems and data warehouses, SQLstream greatly reduces the time it takes for information to flow between products and content providers. This revolutionary system allows for real-time monitoring of virtual ecosystems and economies, placing Gravity Bear at the forefront of an all-new market opportunity that delivers game content to social networks faster and more efficiently than previously possible.

“Our strategic partnership with SQLstream will enable Gravity Bear to measure and understand how players are interacting with our games in real-time and respond faster than ever, delivering the online experience that players really want from social gaming”, said Phil Shenk, co-founder and CEO of Gravity Bear. “It’s a rapidly growing market that we only see expanding further. The casual games industry is constantly evolving and it is very exciting to be in a position to offer players something new that we believe could change the face of entertainment on community sites.”

“Our work with Gravity Bear is leading to an exciting new business opportunity in the social games market,” said Damian Black, President and CEO of SQLstream, “The technologies we will be integrating with Gravity Bear’s unique game design philosophy will help customize game content for the masses, increasing loyalty and resulting in a new kind of relationship between the player and content providers.”

The partnership between SQLstream and Gravity Bear arrives at a time when the social games market is experiencing unprecedented growth. Social platforms such as Facebook have become the birthplace of a new gaming movement with a proven audience of tens of millions. Gravity Bear will use the latest in cutting edge technology, such as SQLstream, to establish new entertainment products that evolve and develop with each player‘s input and participation.

Gravity Bear is currently developing an original IP built to satisfy the company’s core mission of providing new entertainment products for an all-new era of social gaming.

The Gravity Bear and SQLstream teams will be attending the Virtual Goods Summit, held in San Francisco on October 29 and October 30, and are available for meetings and interviews. Additionally, members of both teams can be scheduled for joint press and analyst calls.

About Gravity Bear
Gravity Bear is a new breed of social games company where dedicated game creators share the goal of making unique social games through a steady diet of creativity, fun and contemporary design. Gravity Bear was founded in 2008 by co-founder and gaming industry veteran Phil Shenk to build a seasoned team of like-minded talent devoted to making casual games as distinct as the players themselves. Gravity Bear set up shop in sunny Emeryville, California, where they share office space with a tribe of equally motivated hamsters. For more information on Gravity Bear, please visit: http://gravitybear.com. Follow the Gravity Bear Blog at http://gravitybear.com/blog/.

About SQLstream Inc.
SQLstream is making the real-time web possible, monitoring data streams to deliver instant alerts, analytics and answers to business decision makers. Using the industry standard SQL language, SQLstream executes queries on the wire, before data reaches the warehouse. Built on open source technologies, SQLstream enhances existing business intelligence solutions while maximizing the value received from your organization’s data when really urgent analytics are required. Co-Founded in 2005 by Julian Hyde, architect of the open source Mondrian OLAP engine, SQLstream’s investors and advisors include Bob Frankenberg, former CEO of Novell and current Board Member at National Semiconductor, Dick Watts, former member of Hewlett-Packard’s Executive Committee and Duane Zitzner, former HP Executive. SQLstream is headquartered in San Francisco, California and is on the web at http://www.sqlstream.com. SQLstream is a core contributor to the open source Eigenbase Project at http://www.eigenbase.org

For more information:

Jeane Wong / Juan Castro Rick Saletta
ONE PR Studio SQLstream
510.893.3271 877.571.5775
jeane@oneprstudio.com / juan@oneprstudio.com PR@sqlstream.com

###

New SOCIAL game COMPANY Gravity Bear Formed to ignite explosive casual games sector
 
Games Industry Veterans Launch Studio to Deliver Innovative Casual Games for Growing Social Platforms

Emeryville, California – October 27, 2009 – Gravity Bear announced today it has formally entered the electronic entertainment industry as an independent games studio focused on creating unique and fun social games. The crew at Gravity Bear is led by industry veteran Phil Shenk, who was previously co-founder and Art Director at Flagship Studios. The founding members of Gravity Bear embody decades of experience in the games industry and will deliver engaging original IPs across a variety of platforms and social networks.  
 
Prior to his time at Flagship Studios, Phil Shenk held high profile positions at Blizzard Entertainment, where he worked as Lead Artist on Diablo 2 and later assumed the duties of Designer on Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction.  Phil also worked at the online games company Wild Tangent, where he directed internal and external teams building streaming games for browser-based 3D engines. He also spent time in business development establishing relationships with Microsoft, Sony Pictures, and Fox, enabling them to build applications based on the Wild Tangent Platform. He is joined by a team of like-minded industry veterans from Flagship Studios, Sega Entertainment USA, Inc. and Sony Computer Entertainment America.  
 
“Gravity Bear was formed with the singular aim of creating games that reconnect people to the core of gaming”, said Phil Shenk, Co-Founder and CEO of Gravity Bear, “Our commitment is to bring the caliber of social gaming experiences players want — as they want them – which means delivering new kinds of excitement and fun that blend the latest in modern game design with fresh technology.”
 
The social games landscape is experiencing an explosive growth in popularity, blossoming alongside social platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. With tens of millions of players and fans connecting in new ways, and the projected growth of social gaming to over $1 billion in 2010*, Gravity Bear will introduce game-changing entertainment that will transform the way players and friends connect to one another by splicing the latest in social networking and graphics technologies with stellar game design.
 
At the heart of Gravity Bear are exciting new processes that allow the team to rapidly iterate and adapt its entertainment products, helping to advance the quickly growing social games category. Players will explore evergreen game experiences like never before and watch them evolve according to their own interactions through the rising social gaming scene.
 
Gravity Bear is currently developing an original IP built to satisfy the company’s core mission of providing new entertainment products for an all-new era of social gaming. More information will follow in the coming weeks.
 
About Gravity Bear
Gravity Bear is a new breed of social games company where dedicated game creators share the goal of making unique social games through a steady diet of creativity, fun and contemporary design. Gravity Bear was founded in 2008 by co-founder and gaming industry veteran Phil Shenk to build a seasoned team of like-minded developers, devoted to making casual games as creative, expressive, and fun-loving as the fans that play them. Gravity Bear set up shop in sunny Emeryville, California, where they share office space with a tribe of equally motivated hamsters. For more information on Gravity Bear, please visit: gravitybear.com. Follow the Gravity Bear Blog at: gravitybear.com/blog/.
 
For more information:

Jeane Wong                                                       Juan Castro
ONE PR Studio                                                   ONE PR Studio
510.893.3271                                                     510.893.3271
jeane@oneprstudio.com                                 juan@oneprstudio.com  
 
 
*Swartz, Jon. (October 15, 2009) For social networks, it’s game on. USA Today
 
###

Hey all!  We finally “officially” came out of hiding (or came out of hibernation, as joystiq says! )  Facebook Page is now live!  We need to get our fanbase up so please please invite all your friends!

Linkity links:

Joystiq

Link: joystiq.com/2009/10/26/gravity-bear-comes-out-of-hibernation

Venture Beat

Link: venturebeat.com/2009/10/27/gravity-bear-launches-new-social-games-business/

Crispy Gamer

Link: www.crispygamer.com/news/index.php/2009-10-27/gravity-bear-opens-its-doors/

GamaSutra

Link: www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=21317/

Edge-Online

Link: www.edge-online.com/news/social-game-studio-gravity-bear-comes-out-of-hiding

IGN.com

Link: games.ign.com/articles/103/1039328p1.html

Worthplaying

worthplaying.com/article/2009/10/28/news/69750/

Additional Links:

www.mobygames.com/company/gravity-bear

www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/56153

blog.games.com/2009/10/27/gravity-bear-dips-into-social-gaming

www.casualgaming.biz/news/29398/Industry-veteran-forms-Gravity-Bear

www.charter.net/games_channel/news_read.php?games_rip_id=1039328

www.businessinsider.com/interview-ex-flagship-staff-go-social-with-gravity-bear-2009-10

www.industrygamers.com/news/interview-ex-flagship-staff-go-social-with-gravity-bear

www.strategyinformer.com/news/5949/gravity-bear-will-issue-their-first-official-news-in-a-few-days-time”

tc50tweets.techcrunch.com/story/233449557/gravity-bear-aims-to-raise-the-quality-of-social-games-venturebeat

tweetmeme.com/story/234689970/gravity-bear-opens-its-doors-video-game-news-crispy-gamer

www.zergwatch.com/Newsfeed-235401/industry-veteran-forms-gravity-bear-casualgamingbiz.html

buzzup.com/us/Startups/gravity-bear-aims-to-raise-the-quality-of-social-games/

www.newstin.co.uk/rel/uk/en-010-019519216

www.newspond.com/story=2542241

techblips.dailyradar.com/story/gravity-bear/

tapthehive.com/gravity_bear_aims_to_raise_the_quality_of_social_games.tth

socialgame7.wordpress.com/2009/10/28/gravity-bear-invades-social-games/

www.virtualworldsnews.com/

www.gamingtrend.com/News/index.php?14499

www.tentonhammer.com/node/76069

I’ll post more as they come.  Thanks for the heads-ups on the articles.  Lubs!    If you find more, please send ‘em our way!

-Ether

Edit:  Added more!  Thanks to everyone that is sending me links.  you guys rock! 

We’re plugging away today to pretty up the website for when we launch the site.  Woohoo!

Changes planned for the coming week:

–New Gallery Pictures

–Launch of our Facebook Page

We’re still working away on our forums.  These will likely go up when we announce our game, since they will be used for game-related issues.  We’ll keep you updated when these are close to being ready for launch.

If anyone has suggestions for New Bears let us know!  We’re hoping to have a nice selection of Bears for people to use as their forum avatars.  So far, I think Panderson Cooper (the news bear.  heh heh) and Twitter Bear are my favorite.  Much love to Ryan Rouse for drawing these!  They are pure happiness.