Firefly, the team behind the acclaimed Stronghold series, has taken its next step into publishing by unveiling a new label dedicated to strategy games, called Wuselfaktory. The debut project for the label, Fool King, was showcased at UKIE’s For One Night Only event earlier this year. Fool King comes from first‑time developer Loot Donkey and bills itself as a "tactical autobattler" with a roguelike twist: players assemble and position their forces, then sit back and watch the combat resolve automatically.
Nick Tannahill, the head of Firefly, told GamesIndustry.biz that moving into publishing feels "like every other indie studio doing it right now," but he believes the studio’s deep roots in the strategy genre give it a distinct advantage. While giants such as Paradox Interactive and newer entrants like Hooded Horse have already proven the commercial viability of strategy titles, Wuselfaktory aims to operate on a smaller scale, both in terms of the number of releases and the breadth of each project.
For Fool King, Firefly is providing the financial backing and handling the marketing push, while its parent company Devolver has assigned a producer to oversee localisation and quality‑assurance. Tannahill noted that in the future the studio intends to bring those localisation and QA responsibilities in‑house, leveraging its existing team of roughly fifty staff members. "We already have a small publishing crew, which is why we can do this," he explained. "We've been self‑publishing since 2010, so we have our own pipelines for localisation, marketing and release management, plus solid relationships with platform holders," Tannahill added.
The studio’s decades‑long experience developing strategy games also means it can offer hands‑on development assistance to its partners. "One of the real benefits a publisher can bring is that we’ve sat on the other side of negotiations and relationships, so we can help developers with actual development tasks as well," he said. Firefly is already providing that support to Loot Donkey: the team runs three online titles, and because Fool King features an asynchronous auto‑battler mode, the developers can schedule calls with Firefly’s staff to discuss networking, UI design, and overall game balance.
"We’ve given them multiple rounds of feedback on the core game and consulted on the user interface," Tannahill noted. "Those conversations may be short, but they can dramatically accelerate the project and smooth out potential issues." The decision to start publishing was encouraged by Devolver, which recognised its own limited expertise in the lucrative strategy market. "We were acquired by Devolver in late 2021," Tannahill recalled.
"Since then they’ve basically said, ‘You know strategy – we don’t – why don’t you lead that space?’" The studio’s constant monitoring of upcoming strategy releases also positioned it well to spot promising indie titles. In fact, Tannahill discovered Fool King after reading a feature on Rock Paper Shotgun. "I play a lot of smaller titles for inspiration for Stronghold – anything on Steam or itch.io that catches my eye – to keep my brain fresh and generate ideas for new games," he said. "When I see a game I love, I think about how it could benefit from funding, guidance, or a partnership." Devolver is comfortable letting Firefly handle both the sourcing of titles and the marketing strategy.
"They don’t really understand the nuances of the strategy space, so they trust us to know which press outlets, content creators, and community hubs matter for each sub‑genre," Tannahill explained. He emphasized that speaking the same language as the audience is crucial in a genre where players are often deeply invested in mechanics and balance. To stay close to its community, Firefly employs a somewhat unconventional method: it embeds short surveys into every demo. The questionnaires ask players how much they would be willing to pay, which features they’d like to see, and what future games they’d be interested in.
"It sounds a bit silly, but it works," Tannahill laughed. "We’ve run this for three games now and consistently get around 6,000 responses each time, giving us a solid data set to inform our decisions." The data has revealed a surprisingly youthful demographic for strategy games.
"Our audience skews younger than we expected – a healthy chunk are 18‑25 years old," Tannahill said. "We meet them where they hang out, on the social platforms they use, to keep feeding them fresh IP and keep them engaged with our studio’s series." Tannahill views the strategy genre as both massive and under‑served. "If you look at the top‑hundred‑plus wish‑listed games on Steam, a huge proportion are strategy titles," he observed.
Yet many classic franchises are being neglected. "One of my childhood favourites, Command & Conquer, isn’t getting new entries. It’s not that the IP lacks appeal; it’s that developers haven’t built fresh experiences around it." He sees this gap as an opportunity, especially as other high‑profile genres encounter headwinds.
"Strategy isn’t the flashiest genre any more, but it quietly remains one of the most successful on Steam. While Roblox keeps expanding and console sales face challenges, Steam is uniquely positioned for the future," he argued. "Deep, systems‑driven games cater to players who love to sit at their PCs for hours, replaying scenarios with slight variations and enjoying emergent gameplay. That’s why studios like Hooded Horse are discovering a massive, high‑quality audience." Firefly itself is diversifying within the strategy space.
The studio produces a range of titles, from nostalgic 2.5D isometric games reminiscent of the early Command & Conquer and Age of Empires, to fully 3D experiences like Stronghold 4. "The 2.5D pixel‑perfect aesthetic is popular right now, but we can’t bet everything on a single trend," Tannahill cautioned. "You want a diversified basket without over‑exposing yourself to one style." Wuselfaktory currently represents a single, modest “egg” in that basket, with the potential to add a few more. Since joining Devolver, Firefly has shipped four games and six expansions, and more projects are in development.
While third‑party publishing is part of the long‑term plan, the studio must fit those titles into its existing schedule. "We won’t announce a publishing label and then flood the market with three big releases at once – we can only spin so many plates," Tannahill said. "We’ll start with smaller titles, work in compact teams, and keep the operation sustainable.
That’s the most important thing."