SmiteWorks USA, LLC

Factsheet

Developer:
SmiteWorks USA, LLC
Based in Melbourne, FL

Founding date:
October 1, 2009

Website:
http://www.fantasygrounds.com

Press / Business Contact:
[email protected]

Social:
twitter.com/fantasygrounds2
facebook.com/FantasyGrounds
Instagram
Discord

Releases:
Fantasy Grounds Unity
Tabletop Connect
That Old Time Religion
Fantasy Grounds

Address:
700 Jordan Blass Dr
Melbourne, FL 32940
USA

Phone:
(Contact by email only)

Description

SmiteWorks is the small Indie team responsible for the Fantasy Grounds virtual tabletop. Fantasy Grounds allows gamers to play traditional pen-and-paper style roleplaying games. With the aid of over 150 community developers and partnerships with key RPG publishers, gamers' online experience is tailored to a host of different game systems.

History

Early history

SmiteWorks Ltd. was formed in 2004 and based out of Espoo, Finland. The original owners had a great vision of what online tabletop gaming could be. Each of the current owners and developers were individually drawn to this platform and saw it as a way to allow gaming online for any game system.

2009 - 2013

Doug Davison had used the Fantasy Grounds software since 2008 and instantly fell in love with how flexible and powerful it was. After quickly creating custom rulesets to handle his personal Star Wars Saga campaign needs, he reached out to the original owners and negotiated to purchase the company outright. John Gregory was another end-user and community developer and he joined Doug in January 2010. Together, they have helped bring a large collection of game systems and additional enhancements to Fantasy Grounds and they hope to see it grow further as time goes on.

2014

In April, 2014, Fantasy Grounds secured an official license with Wizards of the Coast to carry fully licensed Dungeons & Dragons modules. Over the course of the year, we release numerous products for the D&D fifth edition game system. Zeph Ponos joined the development team in an official capacity after several years of community development. His work has been inspiring and has earned him immense respect within the Fantasy Grounds community. With Zeph joining the team, SmiteWorks hopes to tackle even bigger projects, such as porting the code engine over to Unity. The port to Unity should allow for better deployment across multiple platforms, such as Mac, Linux, PC, web and tablet. It should also allow for numerous enhancements with 3D, animation, dynamic lighting and more.

2015

In the Fall of 2015, SmiteWorks acquired Tabletop Connect and hired it's creator, Carl Pinder, as a Sr. Software Developer. Tabletop Connect (TTC) included some highly advanced 3D mapping capabilities and improved ease of use for non-official game systems. Because TTC was also developed in Unity, the merger of the Fantasy Grounds code with that of TTC was something that was possible and work has begun on finishing up the Unity port and bringing the best features from both platforms forward, for the benefit of all online gamers. James Holloway joins the team as the Production Coordinator in October.

2016

In December 2016, SmiteWorks signed a contract with Paizo Inc. to provide officially licensed Pathfinder Roleplaying Game content for Fantasy Grounds. David Middleton joins the team as a Customer Support Specialist in December.

2017

SmiteWorks released the first batch of officially licensed Pathfinder Roleplaying Game content for Fantasy Grounds on May 2nd, 2017.

2018

Fantasy Grounds breaks 100,000 licensed users and subscribers. Available DLC exceeds 1200 add-ons with products from more than 80 licensed publishers and Indie artists. SmiteWorks coordinates with 94 community developers to deliver new products weekly for Fantasy Grounds. Ryan Nohr joins the team in July as a Unity Developer. He is working on the updater engine, installer and Mac native builds we hope to release in 2019. Jen Page joins us in November as our Marketing Specialist and Graphic Designer.

2019

Fantasy Grounds launched a Kickstarter for Fantasy Grounds Unity and raised over half a million dollars from 8,520 backers to help bring this forward to completion. After funding, we expanded our team to include Joshua Watmough as an artist, along with Dominic Morta and Hollis Gray as ruleset developers. Fantasy Grounds Unity launches an Alpha in October 2019 and a Closed Beta in November 2019.

2020

Fantasy Grounds launched Fantasy Grounds Unity in Early Access on March 15, 2020 and crosses over 200K licensed users and subscribers. Aaron Saucedo joins the Customer Service team.

Project Press Sheets

Videos

FG Trailer YouTube

FGU Kickstarter Video YouTube

Images

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