Why Zachtronics is shutting down for good this time
Alex Calvin
Wednesday 20th July 2022
About two and a half years ago, Zachtronics founder Zach Barth and the studio's audio and narrative director, Matthew Burns, went for a walk.
During the course of their conversation, Barth said that he wanted to shut down the developer. In short, he had become tired of working there.
"I would say over the years game after game it started to feel samey. I felt like my job started to become more boring every day," he tells GamesIndustry.biz. "Every day we explored the same space more thoroughly and we didn't like exploring new spaces."
Burns adds: "The decision to close Zachtronics came from a desire to try something new. Over the years, we'd found a niche that was really great for us. We really enjoyed playing in that niche and making games for that audience, but it wasn't something that we wanted to do forever.
Matthew Burns, Zachtronics
"It was something that we like doing, but I think all of us on the team were all interested in exploring brand new concepts and things that we couldn't really have done as Zachtronics because over the years we ended up not necessarily making the same game, but very similar games. They were always about the same size and scope."
Since its inception back in 2000, Zachtronics has mostly focused on puzzle games. It is famous for the likes of Opus Magnum, SpaceChem, Shenzhen I/O and Infinifactory. But it has also made other kinds of titles; for example, back in 2013 it released strategy title Ironclad Tactics, before launching visual novel Eliza in 2019. All of which is to say that while yes, Zachtronics has focused on puzzle games, it's not all it has made. So why does the studio have to disband to explore these new ideas?
"They weren't as successful as our
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