Raphaël Colantonio (born 1971) is a French

video game designer Video game design is the process of designing the rules and content of video games in the Video game development#Pre-production, pre-production stage and designing the gameplay, environment, storyline and characters in the Video game development ...

, and was the founder and for 18 years president of

Arkane Studios Arkane Studios SASU is a French video game developer based in Lyon. It was founded in 1999, and released its first game, ''Arx Fatalis'', in 2002. The studio has created the popular Dishonored (series), ''Dishonored'' series as well as developi ...

. He has served as creative director on several of Arkane's titles, including co-creator with Harvey Smith for the ''

Dishonored ''Dishonored'' is a 2012 action-adventure game developed by Arkane Studios and published by Bethesda Softworks. Set in the fictional, plague-ridden industrial city of Dunwall, ''Dishonored'' follows the story of Corvo Attano, bodyguard to th ...

'' series.

Career

When Colantonio was about 18 years old, at the verge of having to perform mandatory military service that France had at the time, he participated in a contest held by

Electronic Arts Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by former Apple Inc., Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry ...

(EA) on knowledge about the ''Ultima'' series, which he had been a fan of. He was unaware that the contest was meant for EA to find qualified applicants for a new studio they were setting up in France, and through the contest, Colantonio was hired into EA, helping with establishing their customer support services in France.

Arkane Studios

With the introduction of home video game consoles, Colantonio saw a shift in EA to more sports-oriented games, an area he was not interested in, and left, taking a position at

Infogrames Atari SA (formerly Infogrames Entertainment SA ()), also known as Atari Group, is a French holding company headquartered in Paris that owns mainly video gaming-related interactive entertainment properties. Atari SA's core subsidiaries include ...

for a short time. He decided around 1999 that he wanted to start his own studio, and with funding support from his uncle, he and three of his friends founded Arkane Studios in Lyon, France. In June 2017, he departed Arkane, though he stayed with the Lyon branch of Arkane to help with transition to new management, while Harvey Smith oversaw the Austin studio. Colantonio stated that he wanted to spend more time with his son and re-evaluate his goals for the future. In a 2020 interview, he said that part of his reason for leaving was "creative anxiety" around delivering a triple A quality game where it felt like more like making a product instead, as well as wanting to take a break to focus on other matters.

WolfEye Studios

Colantonio and Julien Roby, a former producer at Arkane, announced in November 2019 they had earlier formed a new studio, WolfEye Studios, a twenty-person studio working distributively. They announced their first game, '' Weird West'', at

The Game Awards 2019 The Game Awards 2019 was an award show that honored the best video games of 2019. The event was produced and hosted by Geoff Keighley, creator and producer of The Game Awards, and was held to an invited audience at the Microsoft Theater in Los ...

, to be published by

Devolver Digital Devolver Digital, Inc. is an American video game publisher based in Austin, Texas, specializing in the publishing of indie games. The company was founded in June 2009 by Nigel Lowrie, Harry Miller, Graeme Struthers, Rick Stults, and Mike Wil ...

. ''Weird West'', which released on 31 March 2022, is a top-down

action role-playing game An action role-playing game (often abbreviated action RPG or ARPG) is a video game genre that combines core elements from both the action game and Role-playing video game, role-playing game genres. Definition Action role-playing games empha ...

with elements of the

immersive sim An immersive sim (simulation) is a video game genre that emphasizes player choice. Its core, defining trait is the use of simulated systems that respond to a variety of player actions which, combined with a comparatively broad array of player a ...

genre in which the player takes the role of heroes in the

American frontier The American frontier, also known as the Old West, and popularly known as the Wild West, encompasses the Geography of the United States, geography, History of the United States, history, Folklore of the United States, folklore, and Cultur ...

which encounters supernatural elements, with randomized elements through each play through. Colantonio stated in March 2025 that WolfEye was working on a new, unnamed first person immersive sim title.

Music

Colantonio is a musician and performs guitar, bass guitar, and vocals as one half of the Rock/Electro Goth band ''Weird Wolves''. His music has been featured on the soundtracks of several of his video games including ''

Dishonored 2 ''Dishonored 2'' is a 2016 First-person (video games), first person action-adventure game developed by Arkane Lyon and published by Bethesda Softworks for PlayStation 4, Windows, and Xbox One. It is the sequel to 2012's ''Dishonored''. After E ...

'' and ''

Prey Predation is a biological interaction in which one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not ki ...

''. After collaborating with Ava Gore on the song ''Realization'' for the '' Prey: Mooncrash'' soundtrack, the two formed ''Weird Wolves.'' The band went on to produce several tracks for the ''Weird West'' soundtrack.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Colantonio, Raphaël 1971 births French video game designers Knights of the Ordre national du Mérite Living people Place of birth missing (living people) Video game developers ZeniMax Media