IronMonkey and Firemint staff carpool on the way to the office.
Two of Melbourne’s most prominent iOS developers are to become a single entity. IronMonkey, best known for its work on the mobile iterations of Dead Space, Mirror’s Edge and Need For Speed is merging with Firemint, the team responsible for original games like Flight Control, Spy Mouse and Real Racing. Both IronMonkey and Firemint are owned by giant American publisher EA. The combined operation will be known as Firemonkeys.
While the new venture will have plenty of well loved franchises to play with, Puzzle Quest won’t be one of them. It emerged today that the creator of that particular game, Infinite Interactive, parted ways with Firemint in January 2012. Infinite Interactive founder Steve Fawkner told Joystiq that the split had been amicable. He also noted that his studio had never actually been acquired by Firemint, a statement that contradicts a January 2011 press release from Firemint. According to Fawkner, “Infinite does its best work when it’s independent”.