Mindtail, an Istanbul-based mobile game studio, has closed a $2 million pre-seed funding round.
Announced via press release, the round was led by APY Ventures with participation from Inveo Ventures and Ak Portföy GSYF. One of the main goals of the investors is to support the studio’s AI-native production infrastructure.
Mindtail says it aims to use the funding to triple its team in the near term, while also announcing the studio’s first game in the near future. At the crux of it, however, the $2 million will support what Mindtail calls an AI-native production model.
“This round is the moment our collective experience materializes,” Mindtail co-founder and CEO R. Tamer Özgen said in the announcement. “We aim to combine what we’ve learned from products serving hundreds of millions of players with an AI-native production model to set a new standard in hybrid casual puzzle [experiences].”
More and more studios continue to toot the genAI horn, despite the fact that it has garnered a largely negative reception from developers in recent years, with many arguing that it is having a corrosive effect on the industry.
Owlcat Games confirmed the use of genAI to build its upcoming RPG, The Expanse: Osiris Reborn. Companies like Capcom have told investors that it intends to leverage the technology to “improve efficiency and productivity of game development.”
Some developers claim that they will use the technology, but not to create assets. There have been several cases of games shipping with AI-generated copy or imagery—Crimson Desert developer Pearl Abyss apologized to players for failing to disclose the use of genAI during production. The South Korean studio explained it created some placeholder assets using “experimental AI generative tools.” Some of those assets were subsequently found in the finished game.
Last year, Ubisoft and 11 Bit Studios issued similar apologies after placeholder assets produced using genAI were included in Anno 117: Pax Romana and The Alters.
About the Author
Contributing Editor, News, GameDeveloper.com
Diego Nicolás Argüello is a freelance journalist and critic from Argentina. Video games helped him to learn English, so now he covers them for places like The New York Times, NPR, Rolling Stone, and more. He also runs Into the Spine, a site dedicated to fostering and supporting new writers, and co-hosted Turnabout Breakdown, a podcast about the Ace Attorney series. He’s most likely playing a rhythm game as you read this.
