Cloudfire Studios is a Christchurch-based, independent game development studio specializing in creating engaging, beautiful, interactive entertainment for the mass market. We aim to raise the profile of New Zealand-based game development by exporting high quality games all over the world.
Our current project is Starport Delta, a space station builder strategy title where players must balance resources, station maintenance and resident requirements.
Founders
Leith Caldwell
Technical Director
A senior developer with 15 years experience in programming and team leadership, multiple computer science degrees and production experience at a US game studio, Leith is our Technical Director and makes sure we plan our work and work our plan. Leith is also in charge of our marketing endeavours and handling the business side.
Ian Shephard
Creative Director
With 15 years experience in programming, art and music production, a post-graduate diploma in post-production visual effects and work on short films and published games, Ian brings a lot of talent to the team in his role as our Creative Director and touches on most aspects of our games.
History
Leith and Ian have been gamers for most of their lives. After meeting as colleague contractors on a web application development job, they quickly became friends over many shared interests, including games. Discussion often turned to shortcomings in games available on the market, and their desire to craft experiences and tell stories, to make the games they wanted to play and believed would be successful. As commercial-level game development tools became more and more accessible, they decided to join forces and leverage their experience to build something new.