Phasmophobia creator Daniel Knight is one of the lucky few developers to have seen their idea blossom into not only a massive hit, but one that helped define a genre. His self-published ghost-hunting game, of which he was the solo developer, has sold over 25 million copies since its 2020 release, and there’s now a Hollywood movie adaptation in the works from Blumhouse Films.
Now, Knight’s studio Kinetic Games is following in the footsteps of Among Us creator Innersloth by spreading the wealth to other indies. The newly unveiled Kinetic Publishing hopes to provide the kind of support and advice Knight himself would have wanted when he was launching his first game in 2020. Knight has been expanding the Kinetic team to support the new function, hiring director of marketing and partnerships Asim Tanvir. He brings 15 years experience in community, marketing, and social management at some of the world’s biggest publishers, including 2K, Konami, and Zynga.
Right now, Kinetic Publishing’s slate is completely empty, but it’s on the lookout for unsigned games that are around 12–18 months away from release. Although based in the UK, the publisher is open to pitches from across the world over a wide range of genres – with a view to championing just two or three projects a year. “We want to give the teams we bring on board the support and attention they deserve,” Tanvir says, “and build a healthy slate without compromising anything.”
Knight tells GamesIndustry.biz that the idea of Kinetic Publishing has been in the works for a while. “It was always something I wanted to do,” he says. “It’s always been the ultimate goal, ever since I started hiring people, even when I was on my own. It was always in the back of my mind. We’ve been growing quite a lot recently, and now we’re up to 40 people. We’re going to be growing over the next year as well. That’s why now is the perfect time.”
“We have nothing signed up yet,” Tanvir adds. “We’re looking for games within the indie space, whether it’s solo dev or small teams. We’re looking to support and champion creativity within the indie space, help it grow, like we have as a company. We want to give back and support indie developers and help them find success.”
While Kinetic’s own expertise lies in co-operative horror, the team is open to anything: “Cosy games, RPGs, all the good stuff out there; we’re not trying to pigeonhole or box ourselves in,” says Tanvir. And having learned firsthand about the realities of outsourcing, QA, localisation, and bringing on more developers, Knight has plenty of experience to share with upcoming developers.
Indie spirit
Crucially, Kinetic Publishing is independent, with no shareholders or investors. The team controls its own timelines and greenlights its own decisions.
“We are completely independent,” Tanvir stresses. “We love the independent space, even similar titles [to Phasmophobia]. We don’t see that as competition – we see that as a genre. We want to champion the indie space, the developers in that space, and help them grow.
“To this day, we don’t have any investors, financial backers, shareholders, or anything like that. It’s just us. We decide what we do, and we want to support teams like that. We don’t want to change their vision. We want to support them to be the best they can be and find success. Indie games have been the shining light over the last few years, and we feel like we can help after the success that we’ve had and further uplift that space.”
Neither Knight nor Tanvir would be drawn on precise figures, but did intimate that with the commercial success of Phasmophobia, Kinetic Publishing is “well funded.” Both also recognise that because each project is unique, so too should be the support each game gets, be that financial or otherwise. Ultimately, the team seems open to financing anything from a “few hundred thousand” pounds to £1 million, depending on the needs and scope of the title.
“We understand that from project to project, there’ll be different funding needs,” Tanvir says. “Some teams might need a smaller amount, some teams might need a larger amount to get there. We have a realistic vision of what that funding looks like. We want to respect what we’re doing on our side and marry that with respect for the teams we bring on board, as well, adjusting funding based on what the needs are.
“And if a really, really good title came along and needed a bit more than that, we wouldn’t say no. We would, again, look at the project, what the needs are, and then figure out with our team what the funding looks like.”
Firsthand experience
Beyond truly independent funding, Knight’s grassroots experience is a key factor in what Kinetic Publishing has to offer. Moving from being a solo developer to growing a team, scaling up, publishing, and releasing a game first on PC and then console, Knight has personally, and successfully, done it all.
“On the business side of things, things like setting up the company and how they end up handling taxes and getting legal involved, even minor things like setting up trademarks – that’s all the stuff that people just don’t think about, but it’s massively important,” Knight says. “I’ve been through basically everything that any indie studio will go through. We have [firsthand] experience with everything anyone would ever, ever need.
“Explaining to a small dev team why they need to expand is probably one of the biggest things I could help with right at the start. I didn’t want to expand, but I absolutely needed to. I wanted to stay as a solo developer as long as I could. But eventually it just became impossible.”
Tanvir concurs, adding: “We have expertise in all these different areas – we can bring that expertise to the table. We genuinely love the independent space, and we want to help it grow. It’s about empowering that space rather than directing people, telling them, ‘no, don’t do that.’ We just want to let them have that creative freedom and be as successful as possible.”
It’s because of this direct experience that Kinetic Publishing is hitting the ground running as a one-stop shop, blending financial support with development, business, and marketing advice. There are five senior members of the team, each bringing their own disciplinary expertise, with plans to expand with additional hires “soon”.
“It’ll be our team that’s responsible for the greenlight decisions, and we actively keep an eye out in terms of what’s happening in the space,” Tanvir says. “It’s freeing. Hopefully, that comes across to the people who come to us looking for support. We’re looking to support titles that are doing something amazing, doing innovative, creative stuff. We want to champion and support those titles and teams.”
“We don’t want to come in and take creative control of their projects”
Daniel Knight
“And we’re game devs,” Knight adds. “We know these teams want creative freedom. We don’t want to come in and take creative control of their projects. We know that they’re the people who know best what they’re making. I think it’ll be very helpful for indie studios to talk directly to other developers – not just people who are coming in just to fund it. But we can give feedback on people’s games as well as help them get through release.”
With no investors to satisfy, Kinetic won’t have “hard limits” or chase unrealistic timelines, but it expects the games it works with to be released within the next 12 to 18 months. Knight says that the most crucial thing he’s learned is having the right people around him to advise, support, and empower him, and this is something he’s keen to offer with Kinetic Publishing.
“We want to be the kind of publisher that empowers developers, not directs them,” concludes Tanvir.
