Zynga Buys Bonfire, Studio Of Ensemble Veterans

Social game developer Zynga announced its acquisition of Dallas-based Bonfire Studios, one of several firms established by refugees of Microsoft's now-defunct Ensemble Studios. Founded last year shortly after the release of Halo Wars and the closure of Ensemble Studios, Bonfire has focused on projects that seem to have little resemblance to the Age of Empires PC series its staff worked on before, instead releasing a casual strategy game We Farm for iOS devices. With this purchase, Bonfire will now operate as Zynga Dallas and will work to create original IPs for its new parent company. The developers founders will remain at the studio: CEO/president David Rippy will now serve as general manager, Bill Jackson as creative director, and Scott Winsett as senior art director. The acquisition comes just a day after Zynga appointed Yahoo veteran David Ko as the senior vice president of its mobile operations to lead its global mobile operations. It also follows a series of purchases of both North American and international studios specializing in social games and/or mobile titles. Since the beginning of the year, Zynga has bought XPD Media in Beijing, Unoh in Tokyo, Challenge Games in Austin, Conduit Labs in Cambridge, and several others. It recently established a Zynga Japan joint venture with Japanese telecommunications corporation Softbank, too.