A message from Stefan Marcinek, CEO and Founder of Assemble Entertainment
Today I have to share news I never wanted to write: Gentlymad Studios will close at the end of September 2025.
For more than ten years, this team has been more than just a development studio. They've been friends, collaborators, and dreamers. From In Between to Pizza Connection 3 and the Endzone series, they put heart, humor, and incredible talent into everything they made.
Endzone 2 had a journey as challenging as the world it's set in. The Early Access launch brought unexpected difficulties: low sales, mixed reviews, and some very hard conversations. But as Stephan Wirth said, “When criticism rolled in, we didn't retreat.” The team listened, improved, and kept going right until the end. I'll never regret that fight.
In the end, those efforts couldn't sustain the studio. It's heartbreaking for the team, the players, and for me personally.
Thank you to everyone who worked at Gentlymad, and to everyone who played their games, whether you discovered them in a post-apocalyptic wasteland or while running a pizza empire. The people behind these games made them possible, and I’m proud to have worked alongside them.
Here's to each of them:
Daniel Denne - Art Lead, Co-Founder
Matthias Guntrum - Project Lead, Co-Founder
Stephan Wirth - Experience & Project Lead, Co-Founder
Wolfgang Reichardt - Technical Lead, Co-Founder
Anselm Kegel - Programmer
Benedict Wolf - Management Assistant
Constantin Blum - Design Lead
Etienne Miller - UI Artist, UI Concepting
Jonas Albrecht - Technical Artist, Music Composer, Cinematic Artist
Kai Mergener - Material and Environment Artist
Markus Pohl - Technical Artist
Sebastian Louven - 3D Art Generalist
Simone Rus-Denne - Concept Artist & 3D Art Generalist
Stefan Treffeisen - Programmer
Thomas Trocha - Programmer
Tim Johannsen - Writer, Content Artist
Yannick Edler von Hößle - 3D Art Generalist
Alexandra Rossinskaya - Intern, Concept Art
Alina Sommer - Intern Technical Artist
Dario Falcke - Intern
Jana Mößner - Intern Technical Artist, Tooling
Tessa Benz - Intern
Timo Eberl - Programming, Technical Art
Vanessa Voge - Intern UI Design
So to everyone who played our games, gave feedback, or supported us in any way: Thank you.
- Stefan Marcinek (CEO of Assemble Entertainment & Gentlymad Studios)
And now, I’d like to leave the final words to the people who brought these games to life: the Gentlymad Studios team themselves
Dear survivors,
We have some bittersweet news to share: Gentlymad Studios is closing down. This isn’t an easy message to write, but we wanted you to hear it directly from us.
Since founding the studio in 2014, we’ve been lucky enough to create games like In Between, Pizza Connection 3, and of course Endzone - A World Apart. With Endzone 2, we dreamed even bigger. It didn’t start where we hoped, but thanks to your feedback and support, we worked tirelessly through Early Access to bring it to a place we can truly be proud of.
Over the past months, we felt we were at a tipping point - more and more players were beginning to see the vision we had for the game. Not being able to carry it further is heartbreaking for us, but we’re deeply proud of how far it has come.
Through all the ups and downs, it was you, our players, who made this journey so meaningful. Every comment, every idea, every survival story you shared kept us going. You weren’t just our audience - you were part of the team.
From the bottom of our hearts: thank you for believing in us, for playing our games, and for helping shape them into what they became. Though Gentlymad Studios is coming to an end, the worlds we built together will live on through you.