Don't Nod Entertainment SA is a French video game developer based in Paris. Founded in June 2008, it started development on Remember Me. Because of its poor return on investment, Dontnod resolved its financial situation with recourse to public funding to subsidise Life Is Strange, whose successful release raised Dontnod's industry status. Other games they have developed include Vampyr, The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit, Life Is Strange 2, Twin Mirror, and Tell Me Why.
History
Dontnod Entertainment was founded by Hervé Bonin, Aleksi Briclot, Alain Damasio, Oskar Guilbert and Jean-Maxime Moris on 1 May 2008, alongside other ex-Criterion Games, Ubisoft and Electronic Arts staff. Originally based near Paris-Gare de Lyon, the studio moved into its current office in Quartier de La Chapelle to accommodate the company's growth. Unreal Engine is used in all of its releases. The developer's debut title was Remember Me, which would at first be a PlayStation 3-exclusive role-playing game, but was dropped by publisher Sony Interactive Entertainment in 2011 on account of cuts in funding. It was presented at Gamescom the same year to attract another publishing deal; the following year, Capcom acquired the rights and reimagined it as an action-adventure game, released on multiple platforms to mixed reviews and mediocre sales. In 2013, Dontnod was the most subsidised studio by the French agency Centre national du cinéma et de l'image animée. However, January 2014 saw French media outlets reporting that Dontnod was filing for bankruptcy as a result of the poor sales of Remember Me; the bankruptcy proceeding was finalised in February 2018. Dontnod responded to these reports explaining that they were in the process of "judicial reorganisation". The company turned to public funding to finance a new intellectual property because of this. In June 2014, Dontnod announced that they were working with publisher Square Enix on a new game, which was later announced as Life Is Strange and released in 2015 over the course of five instalments. It was initially thought of as a full-length title that Dontnod would self-publish, but became episodic at Square Enix's behest. The game received generally favourable reviews, over 75 Game of the Year awards and listings, and as of May 2017 had sold in excess of three million copies. The critical and commercial success of Life Is Strange caused Dontnod to be solicited by publishers, whereas they previously had to pursue publishers themselves. Dontnod announced in July 2016 that it had entered into a partnership with Hesaw, a Parisian game studio in which Guilbert also held a management role, that saw the latter renamed but remained an independent entity. In April 2018, Dontnod registered with the French stock market regulator Autorité des marchés financiers to become a public company. This came after a turnover of €9.7 million in 2017, a 33-percent increase from the previous year. The subscription period opened on 3 May 2018, with the first day of trading on 23 May. Listed on Euronext PME, Dontnod raised the intended €20.1 million. Twenty-five percent of the funds were spent on partnering with another studio; according to CEO Oskar Guilbert, the rest would allow further project investment as well as improvement and optimisation of production pipelines, with an internal motion capture studio cited among possibilities. Despite Dontnod's public listing, Guilbert, together with investor Kostadin Yanev, intended to keep control over the company. Around this time, the company employed 166 staff members. The studio subsequently acquired Dontnod Eleven and absorbed its operations in June 2018. Following Life Is Strange was Vampyr, an action role-playing game released on 5 June 2018. 70% of the studio's 120 employees were devoted to the development of Vampyr, many of whom had worked on Life Is Strange. The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit, set within the Life Is Strange universe, was announced at E3 2018 and released the same month. Dontnod started developing Life Is Strange 2 in early 2016, after its predecessor proved financially successful, publishing it on 27 September 2018. Dontnod partnered with publisher Bandai Namco to create an adventure game, Twin Mirror, to be released in 2020. Similarly, Dontnod worked with Xbox Game Studios on Tell Me Why, another 2020 adventure game. A subsidiary studio in Montreal, Canada, was announced in May 2020, adding to its more than 250 employees in France.
Philosophy
Guilbert said in April 2016 that the studio had cast off the ambition of making triple A games and would only see themselves devoted to independent projects, in particular, original, narrative-driven intellectual properties, which narrative director Stéphane Beauverger agreed was "part of Dontnod's DNA". The company's guiding principle is to reinvent itself with every game. For the sake of maintaining the motivation of players and publishers, the production cycle since releasing the five-year commitment Remember Me was reduced to two and a half or three years. In 2018, Guilbert said the company would pursue a co-production strategy with future publishers, as was done for Vampyr, limiting their part to forty percent. Each project begins with a designer, writer, and art director, with the occasional producer or engineer. Multiple teams work simultaneously on different projects. "Dontnod Days" are maintained for unsupervised work related to ongoing projects.
