Blumhouse is a well-known name in the world of horror movies, but it hadn’t ventured into the world of video games. Of course, that changed at this year’s Summer Games Fest when the movie studio announced Blumhouse Games, a new publishing initiative. Even more surprising was that the Blumhouse Games team had a raft of projects already lined up. Now, thanks to a new interview, we know a little more about the horror publisher and its plans.
“We are further than a year ahead of schedule. Our plan was to start releasing games in 2026,” Blumhouse Games president Zach Wood told GamesIndustrybiz in an an exclusive interview.
According to Zach, he and his team (consisting of people currently) expected to publish their first game in 2026. However, Fear the Spotlight will be coming out this year. Zach suggests that’s just the beginning though:”… we have three in 2025, three in 2026, a couple in 2027 and we’re going to maintain that pace.”
It’s the same rapid-fire focus on small, relatively low-risk projects with a high return that has made Blumhouse successful in movies.
CFO Don Sechler weighed in on the relationship between the newly-formed Blumhouse Games and its parent company.
“We can access the broader Blumhouse organisation,” Don told GameIndustry.Biz. “Like pairing up [horror movie writer and director] Brandon Cronenberg with [game writer and director] Sam Barlow [for the upcoming Project C]. That came from the Blumhouse film side. We tried to make that happen and we were able to.”
Zach also said that while the developers they work with retain the rights to their games, Blumhouse will also get the option to turn the idea into a film or TV show.
“If something resonates with our audience, we have opportunities to make a film or a series, and that is exciting.” Zach said.
It’s hard to image that any of the smaller developers Blumhouse Games are working with would object to their ideas being brought to the silver screen or the money that it could bring, but it depends heavily on the exact terms of that agreement, such as how much control Blumhouse would have in terms of radically altering the source material.
Speaking of Blumhouse and movies, the interview raises the question of why Blumhouse Games didn’t choose to use its parent company’s numerous IP such as The Purge or Paranormal Activity. According Zach its because they don’t “want to rush into anything” but says that “We will eventually do it, for sure. We have seen a couple of pitches and we will continue to look at them. But we wanted to start with a solid line-up of originals and come out strongly there.”