Klaus and Brjann Image Form Zoink

Two highly respected Scandinavian download developers, Image & Form and Zoink!, have announced a formal publishing collaboration. Image & Form is best known for SteamWorld Dig on 3DS and — recently — Wii U, while Zoink released the excellent Stick It To The Man on Wii U.

This formal partnership of the two Swedish studios will see Image & Form take on marketing and publishing duties for Zoink!, though they will remain as entirely separate entities in terms of development. Zoink! CEO Klaus Lyngeled has said the following:

Zoink has created many successful IPs and creative games for others, but we’ve always worked through other publishers. Now it’s time to take ownership of our coming titles and sell directly to our customers. The collaboration with Image & Form means we can lift the studio to new levels.

[N]aturally we want to focus on our own ideas, and now we can focus on them. My vision for Zoink has always been to create an incredibly creative studio.

...Earlier we’ve worked dedicated publishers in order to minimize the economic risks of every release. While safe, this also means that we’ve had to give up IP rights, revenue shares and means to influence marketing efforts. Our new sister studio Image & Form have self-published for a good while now, and they’re doing a great job at it. We’ll work closely with them so that more people find and play our games.

CEO of Image & Form, Brjann Sigurgeirsson, pitched in with some typically positive comments on the move.

We’ve been virtually unknown to the game audience, but now we’ve been able to develop and market bigger, deeper games. I look forward to working with Zoink and push their wonderful games as well. Together, we’ll be a real powerhouse - two great studios with separate visions and common goals.

By keeping it local and small, we won’t have to become a publisher that spreads too thin. We’ll have time and resources to focus on every release from both studios.

This does seem like a smart move for both studios, incorporating Image & Form's publication experience with, presumably, mutually beneficial terms; Zoink! previously published Stick It To The Man through publisher Ripstone.

As two studios with an excellent track record, it'll be interesting to see how this partnership blossoms in the future.