This article was originally published on July 10, 2026 - read the full issue

By Patrick Garratt

When Andreas Deptolla was appointed the first president of Atari Europe this month, the move formalised the company's direction in recent years. Listed on Euronext Paris but historically US-centric in its operations, Atari is now building a European organisation with genuine weight: a new legal entity in Munster, three studios under Deptolla's direct oversight following the August 2025 acquisition of Thunderful Group, and a leadership model designed to scale. 

Deptolla, who joined Atari in 2023 as CTO, is pragmatic about the promotion.

"A lot of people are wearing a lot of different hats," he tells Knowledge. "This was not only about technology. I was involved in post-merger integration and many other things. We got to an inflection point and said, 'For the coming years, what do we need to change from an organisation perspective to make sure we're set up for success?" 

The answer was a regional leadership structure. While Ethan Zoubek controls the North American side of the operation as head of Atari Inc, with US studios reporting to him, Deptolla's European remit covers Coatsink in the UK and Swedish studios Stormteller Games and Early Morning Studio – all acquired via Thunderful – along with central services including IT and the gaming database platform MobyGames. He does retain some technology oversight. "We built a system over the last three years. The skillsets, the people, were pretty complementary. It also gave a lot of people career opportunities to take their career to the next level."

Munster funster 

The European base is Munster, in North Rhine-Westphalia. Deptolla spent a decade in Boulder, Colorado, alongside Atari CEO Wade Rosen before returning to Germany.

"Munster brings us a really rich talent pool," Deptolla says. "We have a university here with more than 40,000 students and an active programme with interns, whether in design or development."

"Germany is also doing a lot for the gaming industry – tax credits, incentives, and so on."

While Munster provides Deptolla with the ideal location for managing Atari Europe, the recent Thunderful acquisition brought three European studios with markedly different profiles. Early Morning Studio, based in Stockholm, is a mobile free-to-play developer known for the Vampire's Fall franchise. Coatsink, headquartered in Gateshead, has a decade-plus record across multi-platform development and co-development. Finally, Stormteller Games makes premium titles, attracting critical acclaim with 2025's Lost In Random: The Eternal Die.

Each is to stay structurally distinct, with Atari's publishing labels matched to product.

"We have the Atari Classic brand, Infogrames as a European label, and Thunderful has a pretty strong name. We'll always try to pair the right IP with the right label."

Stability is the explicit priority for the next 12 months. The Thunderful studios had a turbulent few years before the Atari deal closed, with restructuring and layoffs.

"With all of the changes on the Thunderful side, this was a difficult last two or three years for the team. How do you bring stability? How do you bring systems to the teams so they can focus on what they're best at? On the Atari side, we can absorb central functions – finance, legal, HR – and allow the studios to focus on their creativity."

On M&A, Deptolla is focused on consolidation: headcount has grown from around 20 full-time employees three years ago to more than 300 today.

"We need to be really thoughtful about making sure we can digest and integrate what we've acquired," he says.

Resurrecting legacy IP in Europe 

What binds the overall strategy is an insistence on IP ownership. Deptolla is frank that Atari's appetite for conventional third-party publishing has narrowed. "We would rather own the IP, or have agreements in place where we can work on it really, really long term," he says.

"We can then utilise our full network on the publishing and licensing side: for example, what other things can we do with a game, whether it's a movie or otherwise? Long-term thinking is one of our core values."

The studios are positioned accordingly: "We always seek the industry niches in which we can be world class and unique. With the right IP, each of the studios is uniquely positioned to excel." 

David Lowey, Atari's senior director of communications, adds context on what that means for European audiences. Much of Atari's recently revived legacy IP – such as Asteroids, Centipede and Missile Command – carries global rather than regional resonance. The new European footprint, however, is expected to shift focus a little in terms of exploiting properties.

"There are IPs in our portfolio and IPs in Europe that the European playerbase will respond to," Lowey says. "Having feet on the ground, closer to what's going on culturally, we'll probably see some games coming out of Atari that are very familiar to European audiences.

"That's also good for our platform partners, who have global audiences and need to bring out titles with regional appeal."

This article was originally published on July 10, 2026 - read the full issue