Keeping up with the constant flow of hires, promotions and departures across the games sector can be a real challenge, which is why we put together periodic round‑ups to capture the most noteworthy moves. If you know of a recent appointment or transition that belongs in this list, please forward the individual's name, new title, company, as well as their previous role and employer to newhires@gamesindustry.biz. Brian Trunk has been named senior vice president of Route‑to‑Market for the Americas at Asmodee.
Trunk has been affiliated with Asmodee for more than ten years, initially joining as a partner before rising through the ranks. Before his current appointment, he spent 17 years at Wizards of the Coast, where his most recent position was vice president of commercial, digital games revenue, and the Wizards Play Network. At Wizards, he also held a series of senior leadership posts, including vice president and general manager for the EMEA, LATAM and APAC regions. "I’m grateful for my years at Wizards of the Coast and for the people who challenged, taught, and shaped me into the leader I am today," Trunk said.
"I’ve always believed the most successful businesses are built on great people, strong relationships, trust, and community. At Asmodee, those values combine with something else I care deeply about: a shared love of games.
That’s why this move feels personal, and it’s at the heart of how I want to lead here." In other news, David Scarborough has joined Blizzard Entertainment as senior manager of EMEA communications. Scarborough previously served as senior account director at Brands2Life and headed communications at Inflexion Games.
His résumé also includes senior roles at Improbable and at Koch Media/Deep Silver. King has announced the return of Esther Lopez as a principal VFX artist. Lopez first arrived at King in 2014 as a senior artist, earned a promotion to associate principal VFX artist in 2020, and left in 2022 to work for Meta as a real‑time VFX art specialist focusing on VR‑AR experiences.
"Coming back to somewhere I know well, in a new role, is a rare kind of privilege," Lopez explained. "King is where I grew up as an artist, and where some of my best memories were made, making this opportunity even more special.
After almost four years at Meta building immersive experiences, I hope I can bring the best of that back with me." Magda Marcinkowska has been appointed production manager in marketing at CD Projekt Red. Prior to this, she acted as publishing operations director at Techland, overseeing cross‑functional pipelines that linked development, localisation and market launch activities.
Linh Lai has secured a permanent role as accounting assistant at Newzoo after completing a six‑month internship. "The experiences I’ve gained throughout these six months have helped me better understand not only how individual accounting processes work, but also how they connect to the wider business," Lai remarked. "I’m excited to take on more responsibility, deepen my accounting and finance knowledge, find more ways to make our accounting processes even more efficient, and contribute more to the team as I grow with Newzoo." Tommi Virolainen joins Kokoon Games as senior game programmer. He previously worked as a tech programmer at Metacore and held senior programming and development positions at Lightneer, where he helped ship several mobile titles that achieved high retention rates.
Christopher Holtorf has been named senior quest designer at CD Projekt Red. Before this, he served as senior narrative designer at Intrepid Studios, contributing to world‑building and story‑craft for several AAA‑scale projects.
Amir Satvat steps into the role of general manager at 1Up Ventures. Satvat formerly was business development director at Tencent Games and is also the founder of Always Supporting the Games Community (ASGC), a platform that assists industry professionals in finding new employment. "I wanted to feel a more direct connection between the things I could influence and do with a team and putting people back to work," Satvat said.
"I wanted to see more people's dreams of making games come true because of something I did. I also hoped I could work in a setting focused on smaller studios, because I love games of that size so much, and in a setting built around community first. My final wish was to work with colleagues who share the same values and integrity I try to hold myself to. In accepting the team’s invitation to join 1Up, I am seeing all of these wishes realised.
1Up is a very important player in the games ecosystem, and I want to see its unique approach to games investing survive for as long as possible." Lasse Seppänen announced his departure from Supercell after a seven‑year tenure. He joined the company in 2019 as a producer, later becoming head of game production services and general manager for Supercell London.
"Now it's time to follow my passion for creating new game IPs again," Seppänen explained. "I'm staying in the UK, and in 2027 I'm planning to start my own studio once again – more on that when the time is right." Take‑Two Interactive has appointed Giles Derrington as director of global affairs UK. Derrington previously led public affairs for TikTok in the UK. Jess Pearce earned a promotion to senior people partner at Kepler Interactive.
She started at Kepler as a people advisor in 2022 and moved to people partner in 2024 before assuming the senior title. Shreya Godha has been promoted to producer at PlaySimple Games after serving as associate producer.
Epic Games named Kelly Ekins director of communications. Ekins came from Unity, where she was senior director of global PR for the Games and Made with Unity program.
Before Unity, she spent time at Warner Brothers Games Montreal as studio lead for game marketing and communications. Housemarque co‑founder and managing director Ilari Kuittinen is stepping down after 31 years.
Kuittinen co‑founded Housemarque with Harri Tikkanen in 1995 after merging their studios Bloodhouse and Terramarque. "Looking back, I feel immensely fortunate," Kuittinen reflected. "We had the luck of being in the right place at the right time during three decades of incredible industry growth, allowing us to stay fiercely independent for 26 years before finding a home within the PlayStation Studios family.
We have been planning this leadership transition carefully behind the scenes. On July 1, Sami ‘Haxu’ Hakala officially stepped into the managing director role, and I have continued supporting him and the leadership team until today to ensure complete operational continuity and stability. Housemarque’s strategy and creative vision are in exceptional hands." Tamara Feiman has been appointed chief executive officer of Tripledot Studios' Lion Studios.
Feiman began her career at Lion in 2020 as EMEA business development lead, later becoming publishing general manager. "I joined Lion six years ago," she said. "Since then, I've had the privilege of growing alongside the company through its biggest successes, challenges and transformations. But what has always made Lion special is how we work with our partner studios.
Together, we've taken risks, learned quickly and turned great ideas into games played by millions. And Lion has never been about one person. I'm fortunate to work alongside an incredible team across publishing, growth, product, engineering and market intelligence, as well as our talented studio partners around the world." Heather Sangria has taken the role of community manager at Sega of America. She previously worked as a contract social strategist and community lead at One More Game and held a digital strategy and community manager position at Undead Labs.
Emily Rose Chen has been promoted to senior product manager for Call of Duty at Activision Blizzard after joining the company as a financial analyst in 2020 and later moving into product management. Scot McCarron has advanced to senior director of product management for Call of Duty at Activision Blizzard. He originally joined Activision in 2018 as product marketing manager for emerging franchises before climbing the product management ladder.