Radiant Entertainment

From Wikipedia the free encyclopedia

Radiant Entertainment, Inc.
Company typeSubsidiary
IndustryVideo games
Founded2011; 13 years ago (2011)
Founders
  • Tom Cannon
  • Tony Cannon
Headquarters
Los Altos, California
,
US
Key people
Products
ParentRiot Games (2016–present)

Radiant Entertainment, Inc. is an American video game developer based in Los Altos, California. Founded by twin brothers Tom and Tony Cannon in 2011, the company has developed Stonehearth, a city-building game, which was released in July 2018 after three years in early access. Radiant was acquired by Riot Games in March 2016 and Radiant's second game, Rising Thunder, was canceled during its alpha phase. The game was later replaced by a freeware "community edition" in January 2018.

History[edit]

Radiant Entertainment was founded by twin brothers Tom and Tony Cannon. They had previously launched the Evolution Championship Series (Evo), an esports tournament for fighting games, and developed GGPO, a fighting game middleware platform. They were most recently employed as software engineers for VMware but quit their jobs in 2011 to develop video games full-time, founding Radiant in Los Altos, California.[1][2][3] The studio launched a crowdfunding campaign via Kickstarter for Stonehearth, a city-building game, in 2013, initially seeking US$120,000. The funding concluded one month later with a total of $751,920 pledged by backers.[4][5] Stonehearth was made available in early access in June 2015 and released in July 2018, although many development goals from the Kickstarter campaign were left unfulfilled.[6][7] In a June 2015 round of seed funding, Radiant raised $4.5 million from investors Andreessen Horowitz, London Venture Partners, and General Catalyst.[8]

Radiant's second game, Rising Thunder, was announced in July 2015.[9][10] It was a fighting game created by Seth Killian, who had joined the studio after departing Santa Monica Studio.[11] A "technical alpha" was opened to a handful of players at the end of the month and to the general public in August.[12][13][14] On March 8, 2016, Radiant announced that it had been acquired by Riot Games, the developer of League of Legends, for an undisclosed sum.[15][16][17] Alongside the acquisition, Rising Thunder was canceled and consequently shut down later that month.[18] The development team behind Rising Thunder was re-allocated to a new, unannounced project.[19] A freeware version of Rising Thunder, dubbed the "community edition", was released in January 2018 with open-source servers.[20]

In August 2019, Tom Cannon announced that Radiant was developing another fighting game, revealed in October to be set in the League of Legends universe and codenamed "Project L".[21][22] In February 2024, the game was announced to be titled "2XKO" and set for a 2025 release.[23]

Games developed[edit]

Year Title Platform(s)
2015 Rising Thunder Windows
2018 Rising Thunder: Community Edition Windows
Stonehearth macOS, Windows
2025 2XKO PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Windows

References[edit]

  1. ^ Narcisse, Evan (April 30, 2013). "They Changed Fighting Games, Now They're Making Something New". Kotaku. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  2. ^ Wawro, Alex (June 25, 2015). "Stonehearth studio nets $4.5M to keep making PC games". Gamasutra. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  3. ^ Hillier, Brenna (April 30, 2013). "EVO founders Kickstart first game, Stonehearth". VG247. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  4. ^ Devore, Jordan (April 29, 2013). "Evo founders launch Kickstarter for new game Stonehearth". Destructoid. Archived from the original on May 7, 2016. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  5. ^ Vandell, Perry (June 3, 2013). "Stonehearth Kickstarter gets successfully funded, and then some". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  6. ^ Fillari, Alessandro (June 6, 2015). "Stonehearth is out now on Steam Early Access". Destructoid. Archived from the original on May 21, 2016. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  7. ^ Wood, Austin (July 6, 2018). "Stonehearth's development will end this month, without meeting all its Kickstarter stretch goals". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  8. ^ Weber, Rachel (June 25, 2015). "Radiant Entertainment raises $4.5m in seed funding". GamesIndustry.biz. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  9. ^ Leone, Matt (July 20, 2015). "Rising Thunder is a new fighting game from Seth Killian". Polygon. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  10. ^ Brown, Fraser (July 21, 2015). "Rising Thunder is a F2P fighting game for PC from the founders of EVO". PCGamesN. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  11. ^ Wawro, Alex (July 20, 2015). "Seth Killian joins Radiant to pitch in on new F2P fighting game". Gamasutra. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  12. ^ Rignall, Jaz (July 31, 2015). "Rising Thunder Technical Alpha Opens". USgamer. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  13. ^ McWhertor, Michael (August 10, 2015). "Fighting game Rising Thunder's alpha is now open to all". Polygon. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  14. ^ Wilde, Tyler (August 10, 2015). "The Rising Thunder technical alpha is now open to all". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  15. ^ McWhertor, Michael (March 8, 2016). "Riot Games acquires Rising Thunder and Stonehearth studio Radiant Entertainment". Polygon. Archived from the original on June 26, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  16. ^ Sinclair, Brendan (March 8, 2016). "Riot acquires Radiant". GamesIndustry.biz. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  17. ^ Williams, Mike (March 8, 2016). "League of Legends Publisher Picks Up Stonehearth/Rising Thunder Studio". USgamer. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  18. ^ Wawro, Alex (March 8, 2016). "Acquired by Riot, Radiant shuts down Rising Thunder". Gamasutra. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  19. ^ Chalk, Andy (March 8, 2016). "Riot Games acquires Radiant Entertainment, Rising Thunder no more". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  20. ^ Bailey, Dustin (January 18, 2018). "The free, open source edition of cancelled fighter Rising Thunder is now available". PCGamesN. Archived from the original on July 7, 2018. Retrieved July 7, 2018.
  21. ^ Romano, Sal (August 2, 2019). "Riot Games and Radiant Entertainment developing new fighting game". Gematsu. Archived from the original on May 18, 2020. Retrieved July 4, 2020.
  22. ^ McWhertor, Michael (October 15, 2019). "League of Legends fighting game is Riot's 'Project L'". Polygon. Archived from the original on December 8, 2019. Retrieved July 4, 2020.
  23. ^ "Project L is now 2XKO: Year in Preview 2024". Riot Games. February 22, 2024. Retrieved March 29, 2024.
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