Big Blue Bubble, Inc. is a Canadian

video game company The video game industry encompasses the development, marketing, and monetization of video games. The industry encompasses dozens of job disciplines and thousands of jobs worldwide. The video game industry has grown from niches to mainstream. ...

headquartered in

London, Ontario London (pronounced ) is a city in southwestern Ontario, Canada, along the Quebec City–Windsor Corridor. The city had a population of 422,324 according to the 2021 Canadian census. London is at the confluence of the Thames River, approximate ...

founded in

2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 6 ...

by industry veteran Damir Slogar, Renata Slogar, and Claudette Critchley. The company has developed over one hundred games and gained international recognition with their game

My Singing Monsters ''My Singing Monsters'' is a 2012 video game franchise developed by Big Blue Bubble and published by Canada Media Fund. The first game of the series was released on September 4, 2012, for Apple iOS. Ports of the game for other operating system ...

which has been downloaded over 100 million times. Swedish company

Enad Global 7 Enad Global 7 AB (also known as EG7) is a Swedish video game holding company based in Stockholm. It was founded as Toadman Interactive in 2013 by Robin Flodin and Rasmus Davidsson as a work-for-hire consultancy studio. The company began fully ...

acquired Big Blue Bubble on August 27, 2020.

History

Early Years (2004 - 2009)

Founded in

by industry veteran Damir Slogar, along with co-founders Renata Slogar, Claudette Critchley. In the early days of its history, Big Blue Bubble made a name for itself by specializing in casual and

mobile games A mobile game, or smartphone game, is a video game that is typically played on a mobile phone. The term also refers to all games that are played on any portable device, including from mobile phone (feature phone or smartphone), tablet, PDA to ...

. Its first game, ''Bubble Trouble'', was used in marketing campaigns by

Nokia Nokia Corporation (natively Nokia Oyj, referred to as Nokia) is a Finnish multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications industry, telecommunications, technology company, information technology, and consumer electronics corporatio ...

and it was followed by space thriller ''Captain Lunar'', which was used as a launch title for the

Sony Ericsson T610 The Sony Ericsson T610, released in 2003, is a mobile phone manufactured by Sony Ericsson. It was one of the first widely available mobile phones to include a built-in digital camera, Bluetooth, color screen, joystick navigation, and was a very ...

. Soon after, Big Blue Bubble began adapting film and television franchises, such as 24 for handheld devices. In the mid to late 2000s, the company started moving towards

console Console may refer to: Computing and video games * System console, a physical device to operate a computer ** Virtual console, a user interface for multiple computer consoles on one device ** Command-line interface, a method of interacting with ...

development, to include the

Wii The Wii ( ) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was released on November 19, 2006, in North America and in December 2006 for most other Regional lockout, regions of the world. It is Nintendo's fifth major ho ...

and

PlayStation 2 The PlayStation 2 (PS2) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Sony Computer Entertainment. It was first released in Japan on 4 March 2000, in North America on 26 October 2000, in Europe on 24 November 2000, and in Australia on 3 ...

platforms.

Return to Mobile (2010 - 2012)

In the early 2010s, Big Blue Bubble returned to its roots in mobile gaming and the '

freemium Freemium, a portmanteau of the words "free" and "premium," is a pricing strategy by which a basic product or service is provided free of charge, but money (a premium) is charged for additional features, services, or virtual (online) or physical (o ...

' business model. This return to mobile resulted in a shifting focus on original

intellectual properties Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, cop ...

such as ''Burn the Rope'', ''Thumpies'', and most notably ''

''.

Post-My Singing Monsters (2012 - Present)

Released on September 4, 2012, for

Apple An apple is an edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus domestica''). Apple fruit tree, trees are agriculture, cultivated worldwide and are the most widely grown species in the genus ''Malus''. The tree originated in Central Asia, wh ...

iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also includes ...

, ''

'' was both a critical and commercial success soon after its release, with

Kotaku ''Kotaku'' is a video game website and blog that was originally launched in 2004 as part of the Gawker Media network. Notable former contributors to the site include Luke Smith, Cecilia D'Anastasio, Tim Rogers, and Jason Schreier. History ...

describing the game as a "clever combination of music and monster breeding", praising how the complexity of a song can become developed by the utility of breeding Monsters, each monster revealing a new line to the song. Through continued support, the game has grown into a

multimedia franchise A media franchise, also known as a multimedia franchise, is a collection of related media in which several derivative works have been produced from an original creative work of fiction, such as a film, a work of literature, a television program or ...

, with a prequel, several spin-off games, books, live events and series, and a

board game Board games are tabletop games that typically use . These pieces are moved or placed on a pre-marked board (playing surface) and often include elements of table, card, role-playing, and miniatures games as well. Many board games feature a comp ...

. After years in the mobile game space, Big Blue Bubble made the decision to return to console games with the development of the action-platformer, ''Foregone'', a retro-pixel side-scrolling adventure that released on the

Epic Games Store The Epic Games Store is a digital video game storefront for Microsoft Windows and macOS, operated by Epic Games. It launched in December 2018 as both a website and a standalone launcher, of which the latter is required to download and play gam ...

February 27, 2020 and

Nintendo Switch The is a hybrid video game console developed by Nintendo and released worldwide in most regions on March 3, 2017. The console itself is a Tablet computer#Gaming tablet, tablet that can either be docking station, docked for use as a home video ...

Xbox One The Xbox One is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. Announced in May 2013, it is the successor to Xbox 360 and the third base console in the Xbox series of video game consoles. It was first released in North America, parts of ...

, and

PlayStation 4 The PlayStation 4 (PS4) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Announced as the successor to the PlayStation 3 in February 2013, it was launched on November 15, 2013, in North America, November 29, 2013 in ...

on October 13, 2020. On May 12, 2021, Big Blue Bubble announced that the ''My Singing Monsters'' series would be releasing its first console title called ''My Singing Monsters: Playground''. The game subsequently released on November 9, 2021. On August 26, 2020, Swedish company

acquired Big Blue Bubble for $16M CAD, alongside a debt-free payment of $60M CAD. Recently announced for

Steam Steam is a substance containing water in the gas phase, and sometimes also an aerosol of liquid water droplets, or air. This may occur due to evaporation or due to boiling, where heat is applied until water reaches the enthalpy of vaporization ...

, Big Blue Bubble is currently developing a music-based

roguelike deck-building game A roguelike deck-building game is a hybrid genre of video games that combine the nature of deck-building card games with procedural-generated randomness from roguelike games. Gameplay aspects Most roguelike deck-building games present the playe ...

, ''Power Chord''.

References

External links

Big Blue Bubble company websiteBig Blue Bubble
at

GameSpot ''GameSpot'' is an American video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information on video games. The site was launched on May 1, 1996, created by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. In addition ...

Big Blue Bubble
at

IGN ''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...

Canadian companies established in 2004 Companies based in London, Ontario Video game development companies Video game companies of Canada Video game companies established in 2004 2020 mergers and acquisitions Canadian subsidiaries of foreign companies {{company-stub