Keeping up with the constant flow of hires, promotions, and departures across the games sector can be a real challenge. That’s why we gather the most noteworthy personnel moves into periodic round‑ups, giving readers a single place to catch up on who’s joining, leaving, or advancing within the industry. If your organization has recent staffing changes that merit inclusion, please forward the individual’s name, new title, company, and previous role to newhires@gamesindustry.biz.
Brian Trunk has been promoted to senior vice president of Route‑to‑Market for the Americas at Asmodee. Trunk has been affiliated with Asmodee for more than ten years, initially as a partner before moving into senior leadership. Prior to his current appointment, he spent 17 years at Wizards of the Coast, where his most recent responsibilities included serving as vice president of commercial, overseeing digital‑games revenue, and managing the Wizards Play Network. During his tenure at Wizards, Trunk also held a series of senior positions, such as 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 intersect 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 Improbible and at Koch Media/Deep Silver, giving him a broad perspective on brand storytelling across multiple markets. King has announced the return of Esther Lopez as a principal VFX artist. Lopez originally came aboard King in 2014 as a senior artist, earned a promotion to associate principal VFX artist in 2020, and then departed in 2022 to work for Meta as a real‑time VFX specialist in VR‑AR.
"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 named production manager in marketing at CD Projekt Red. Before this appointment, she acted as publishing operations director at Techland, where she oversaw cross‑functional pipelines that linked development, localisation, and distribution.
Linh Lai secured a full‑time position 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 has joined Kokoon Games as a senior game programmer.
Virolainen previously worked as a tech programmer at Metacore and held senior programming and development positions at Lightneer, giving him a strong background in performance‑critical code and cross‑platform optimisation. Christopher Holtorf is now senior quest designer at CD Projekt Red, after serving as senior narrative designer at Intrepid Studios where he helped craft branching storylines and immersive quest structures for large‑scale multiplayer experiences. Amir Satvat has taken the role of general manager at 1Up Ventures. Satvat formerly acted as business development director at Tencent Games and is also the founder of Always Supporting the Games Community (ASGC), an initiative that assists job seekers in finding positions within the industry.
"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 moving into senior positions such as 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 United Kingdom, where he managed regulatory outreach and stakeholder engagement. Jess Pearce has been promoted to senior people partner at Kepler Interactive. Pearce started at Kepler as a people advisor in 2022, advanced to people partner in 2024, and now oversees talent strategy across the publisher’s growing portfolio.
Shreya Godha earned a promotion to producer at PlaySimple Games after serving as associate producer, where she coordinated cross‑functional teams and helped launch several mobile titles. 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. Earlier in her career she led marketing for media and entertainment at Unity and worked as studio lead for game marketing and communications at Warner Brothers Games Montreal. Ilari Kuittinen, co‑founder and managing director of Housemarque, has stepped down after 31 years.
Kuittinen co‑established the studio in 1995 alongside Harri Tikkanen after merging their companies 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 Studios in 2020 as the 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. Sangria previously worked as a contract social strategist and community lead at One More Game and handled digital strategy and community management for 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 moving into product management roles. Scot McCarron has advanced to senior director of product management for Call of Duty at Activision Blizzard. McCarron originally joined Activision in 2018 as a product marketing manager for emerging franchises before climbing the product‑management ladder. These announcements collectively illustrate the dynamic nature of talent movement within the gaming ecosystem, highlighting how experience across publishing, development, marketing, and community engagement continues to shape the industry’s future.