TEQUILA WORKS

The Madrid studio on ‘creating with gusto’ and refusing to get drunk on success

- CHRIS SCHILLING

Celebratory drinks are traditional at the end of any creative project. And at a certain Madrid studio, tequila shots and a distillery are central to its immediate post-launch plans. Yet it’s not what you might think. These are Tequila Works’ terms for, respectively, internal game jams and a small group tasked with conceiving and developing short-form projects that may inspire future games, or influence ongoing ones. This focus on creative experimentation is one of several smart decisions that has seen this boutique dev grow from two founders to more than 80 full-time staff as it marks its tenth anniversary. Still, the studio’s creative figurehead Raúl Rubio is staying humble. “Back in the day, we were young and foolish,” he says. “Now we are just old, not wiser. But when you grow old you look wiser, so that kind of works.”

Rubio left MercurySteam, where he had worked on Castlevania: Lords Of Shadow, to set up the studio in 2009 alongside chairwoman Luz Sancho. The two established a motto: creating with gusto. “We thought there was room for top-quality, small experiences,” he says. “A smaller package, but keeping the high quality that we were used to as professionals. That’s why we gathered together people from not just the game industry, but animation and comics too.”

Tequila Works’ first game, Deadlight, originated from a piece of concept art painted by the studio’s art director César Sampedro Guerra: a landscape in silhouette, with strange figures between the trees. Following a desperate park ranger looking for his wife and daughter, the game involves more flight than fight, as you struggle to escape the undead. Tequila Works drew inspiration from the cinematic platformers of the late ’80s and early ’90s: Another World, Flashback,