Gavin Raeburn is considered one of the fathers of the success of the Forza Horizon series, but the developer does not intend to continue developing games in Playground Games. After 12 years, the co-founder of the studio left the company managed by Microsoft.
In November, Playground Games launched one of the best games of 2021 – Forza Horizon 5 was chosen by our editorial staff as GOTY in the last 12 months . One of the fathers of the series’ success is Gavin Raeburn, who founded the British studio in 2009 with Trevor Williams and Ralph Fulton. So far, the developers have offered players only five parts of the Forza Horizon series.
Today, Microsoft and Playground Games confirmed that Gavin Raeburn has decided to leave the studio after 12 years as director. Trevor Williams, who was previously the CEO, will take his place and will be boss of the entire company.
Microsoft’s head of Forza and Fable, Alan Hartman, said goodbye to the developer with the following words:
“After 12 years working on five award-winning Forza Horizon games, Gavin Raeburn is leaving Playground Games as Studio Director. A founding member of Playground Games, we thank Gav for his leadership and contributions to the Forza franchise and wish him all the best. Co-founder Trevor Williams will transition from General Manager to Studio Head effective immediately, as the Playground Games team focuses on updates to Forza Horizon 5 and the development of Fable.”
Gavin Raeburn is a true legend of the British gaming industry. Before founding Playground Games, the creator was an employee of Codemasters for over 24 years and developed brands such as DiRT, GRID and F1. Currently, it has not been confirmed who recruited the developer, but we can suspect that the developer decided to face a new challenge.
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