Zynga Acquires Area/Code

By On January 21, 2011 · 1 Comment

Zynga has acquired rival social game developer Area/Code for an undisclosed sum. Area/Code was founded in 2005 and was one of the pioneering social game developers, creating a branded Parking Wars social game for A&E that launched in 2008. Other well-known titles include the iPhone puzzle game Drop7 and the Ubisoft-published Facebook game CSI: Crime City. As part of the deal, Area/Code will become Zynga New York. General Manager Demitri Detsaridis will remain with the studio and co-founder Frank Lantz will stay on as Creative Director.

“We want to make great games on a large scale. Our ambition is to contribute in a major way to the evolution of games on social networks, to make games in this space that are deeper and more interesting, games that reward the time and attention of the millions of people who play them with complex, meaningful experiences. We believe our best shot at doing this is working with Zynga, the biggest, most successful company in this space,” said the studio in a post to its official blog.

Area/Code co-founder Kevin Slavin will depart the studio to focus on new ventures. Area/Code is Zynga’s ninth acquisition in the past eight months and its second acquisition in the past three weeks, following Zynga’s purchase of the social Web browser Flock. Other prior acquisitions include iOS developer Newtoy, Chinese developer XPD Media, HTML5 developer Dextrose AG, and Dallas-based Bonfire Studios. Right now Zynga’s flagship game is CityVille, which serves a record-breaking audience of over 100 million MAU.