Former Ubisoft Barcelona workers launch Dark Ritual Studios, an indie developer focused on "craftsmanship over scale"

A group of former Ubisoft Barcelona developers, led by Myles Kerwin, has launched Dark Ritual Studios in Barcelona with a clear pitch: smaller teams, faster decisions, and more room for craftsmanship. The move follows Ubisoft’s elimination of 51 positions at its Barcelona studio after Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced shipped in June, adding another example of senior talent spinning out into indie development.

Dark Ritual Studios is already working on its debut project, Puzzle Mage, a dark fantasy PC game planned for 2027. The studio says it has secured funding to finish the game and is currently weighing whether to self-publish or pursue a publishing partner. That choice matters, because it will shape everything from milestone pressure to marketing reach and how much control the team keeps over scope and production cadence.

Kerwin frames the studio’s strategy as a reaction to the friction of large-scale AAA production: keep the team small, preserve creative ownership, and avoid the coordination overhead that can slow iteration. For developers, that’s a familiar tradeoff—less brute-force production capacity, but potentially better agility, clearer accountability, and lower burn. The studio is also trying to stay disciplined on budget and scope, which is increasingly the difference between survivable indie projects and expensive dead ends.

Early signals are positive: Puzzle Mage has passed 1,000 Steam wishlists, and playtest feedback has reportedly been strongest around the spell-casting system. The broader context is the same one many teams are navigating...