Angry Birds maker recruits core game dev to head new studio

Angry Birds maker Rovio Entertainment has hired an industry veteran mostly known for overseeing core-targeted games, Easy Studios' former GM Oskar Burman, to head up its new office in Stockholm. The Swedish branch is Rovio's first development studio outside of its home country Finland, and the company intends to build a new team under Burman's leadership. This group will work on Rovio's current games, as well as new projects. Rovio hasn't said whether the studio will make core titles or mid-core games -- the latter a nascent category that combines immersive gameplay with casual mechanics and often a free-to-play model -- but Burman has traditionally worked on projects with a core bent. When he was studio manager at Avalanche, he ovesaw the development of open-world action game Just Cause 2. And at his most recent job at Electronic Arts subsidiary Easy Studios, Burman worked on free-to-play third-person shooter Battlefield Heroes. Though Rovio has mostly focused on its Angry Birds franchise ever since the casual game series became a phenomenal hit a couple of years ago, it began releasing new titles again last July, starting with physics-based puzzler Amazing Alex.