Louis Castle, a veteran game developer of games such as Command & Conquer, has taken a job as head of Amazon Game Studios in Seattle. He becomes a part of Amazon’s growing contingent of veterans game makers such as Rich Hilleman, the former chief creative director at Electronic Arts who joined Amazon Game Studios last summer.
Castle was most recently a game designer at Kixeye, a San Francisco maker of hardcore social mobile games, where he worked on War Commander: Rogue Assault.
Amazon is amassing a whole stack of game technologies, such as its Lumberyard game engine and its Twitch gameplay livestreaming service. It is running games on its Amazon Web Services cloud, and it is also making games under the Amazon name.
As a cofounder of Westwood Studios, Castle began making games 34 years ago. He worked on more than 150 games, including the Command & Conquer series and the Dune series of real-time strategy games.
“I’m thrilled to join the talented game makers at Amazon Game Studios,” Castle said. “Their dedication to community, customer experiences, and quality is exhilarating! I’m excited to start using Twitch, Lumberyard, and Amazon Web Services to build awesome new experiences for players, casters, and viewers alike.”
Amazon is expanding its game studios in Seattle; Orange County, Calif.; Austin, Texas; and San Diego.