Codemasters Establishes New Online Division

Officials from UK publisher and developer Codemasters have announced that the company has established a new division, named Codemasters Online Gaming. The new division of the company will focus specifically on massively multiplayer online (MMO) games and online casual games. David Solari has been appointed as Director of Codemasters Online Gaming, with responsibility for all business and product opportunities within the online space. Solari was previously Codemasters' PC Group Brand Manager, working on titles such as Operation Flashpoint and Soldiers. Under Solari, the division is preparing an online casual games portal as its first initiative to attract the mass-market online gamer. For the core online gaming audience, a series of publishing and operation deals for major MMO gaming products will apparently be announced shortly. Other senior appointments in the division include Phil “Vortal” White as Head of Massively Multiplayer Gaming, Nick Pili as Head of Internet Gaming, Ed Relf as Head of Codemasters Online Gaming Marketing and Adam Hance as Head of Interactive Marketing. Codemasters has long attempted to take advantage of the growing online market, but its various attempts have so far been thwarted, with partially developed MMO Dragon Empires being cancelled last September due to 'technical issues'. The company later announced that it would use new capital gained from a 40 percent buyout by venture capital company Benchmark to fund an "acquisition offensive" at E3 2005. No announcements have since been made by the company, suggesting that the proposed MMO revelations could involve deals made or in negotiation at that time.