Tiny Speck Opens the Curtain on a Game of Giant Imagination

SAN FRANCISCO, CA--(Marketwire - Sep 27, 2011) - Tiny Speck, a San Francisco-based company, will unveil today at 10 am Pacific/1 pm Eastern the world of Glitch, a highly crafted, artfully detailed, rich online game for the extra-ordinary player. Available to play for free at www.Glitch.com, the social, massively-multiplayer online game has already attracted tens of thousands of players in the beta phase. The ambitious next project from four of the original team behind Flickr, Stewart Butterfield, Cal Henderson, Eric Costello, and Serguei Mourachov, Glitch was born out of a desire to create an engaging and thought provoking online social game compelling to the connoisseur of the curious.

What is Glitch?
Glitch is a non-violent, highly social, web-based, massively-multiplayer game that takes place in the collective imagination of 11 particularly imaginative giants. The world exists on a persistent, ever-evolving playground with the aim of creating infinite play. Designers and players create the Glitch universe in tandem, the former constantly modifying and improving the platform, while the latter cultivates a sophisticated and irreverent online civilization. And nearly anything can be created and experienced: from curating an art installation, to hosting a diamond-infused dinner party, riding the subway, building a house or hosting a gathering with friends outside the great Bureaucratic Hall. Glitch is not a "click for click's sake" type of game; rather it respects the value of play to human life.

"Our vision for Glitch is to bring a new level of creativity, beauty and social engagement to players who expect more from their online social gaming experience -- an experience that has value beyond traditional forms of entertainment," said Stewart Butterfield, CEO and co-founder of Tiny Speck. "Glitch is an experiment in culture building. We provide raw materials and a stimulating environment, but it's the players who bring the infinite world alive, shaping it with their imagination."

Investing in the Art
Glitch brings together a number of fresh and original visual styles. The look varies as one travels around the world, from psychedelic to surrealism, Japanese cutesy to hyper-saturated pixel art, classic cartoon to contemporary mixed media. Glitch combines original hand-drawn illustration and traditional animation; part of Tiny Speck's mission is to find the best of the best in art and bring it to a wider audience. In addition to the visual aspects, the music, the text and details of the interactions have been crafted for the artful game experience. Legendary Japanese game designer Keita Takahashi, creator of Katamari Damacy and NOBY NOBY BOY, joined the team in July as Glitch game designer, to bring his uniquely creative and emotionally evocative style to the game.

Creation at Internet Speed
Building upon the team's deep experience in web-scale software development, Glitch's technological infrastructure and the rate of new feature releases sets it apart from other MMOs -- patches and new content come on a hour-by-hour timeline, rather than month-by-month. The development team enjoys collaborating with players as the game is created and extended beyond Tiny Speck's imagination.

Extending the Game
Glitch players can stay in touch with the world of Glitch, even when not playing the game through a number of extensions. The full Glitch site, including forums, groups, updates, auctions and other game related features are accessible from mobile device. Tiny Speck has also just launched Glitch HQ, an iOS app that allows players to keep up with updates and social chatter from their game friends, access player profiles, learn new skills and more.

In addition, a number of third party developers have created web and mobile extensions of the game that allow players to manage their inventories, keep track of their auctions, or play games that extend Glitch game-play on mobile devices -- allowing players to take their avatars, inventories, and even in-game friends out of the game entirely and into new experiences. Tiny Speck has a full-featured developer site at http://developer.glitch.com, that features a continually growing list of read/write APIs, developer kits for web, iOS, and Android developers, sample code, sample apps, a developer forum as well as a blog highlighting news, apps and developer stories.

"Glitch provides a rich development environment with highly engaged and active players. We built Glitch in a new and different way from most games, designed for maximum flexibility and ease of deployment. With a community of developers leveraging our API, we can't wait to see how Glitch makes new and exciting appearances in the real world," said Cal Henderson, co-founder and vice president, engineering at Glitch.

About Tiny Speck
Tiny Speck is a new kind of gaming company founded in early 2009 by four of the original members of the Flickr team. With offices in San Francisco and Vancouver, B.C., Tiny Speck is supported by a global team of more than 40 creative professionals in those locations and beyond. The team uses every ounce of their craft to build bits to bytes and summon Glitch to life.