Thomas Waterzooi

Factsheet

Developer:
Thomas Waterzooi
Based in Gent/Brussels, Belgium

Founding date:
December 26, 2017

Website:
studiowaterzooi.com

Press / Business contact:
info@studiowaterzooi.com

Social:
twitter.com/thomaswaterzooi
instagram.com/ThomasWaterzooi

Releases:
Please Touch The Artwork
Please Touch The Artwork 2

Address:
Games Brussels
Rue D'Alost 7/11, 9000 Brussels

Phone:
+32 496 60 54 79

Description

Thomas Waterzooi is a game director from Brussels. He previously worked on Divinity Original Sin (Larian Studios, Baldurs Gate) and Hitman (IO-Interactive ) before becoming a solo-developer in 2018. He focuses on making accessible interactive stories and playful things driven by art, culture, society and human interest. His games are not about skills or high-scores. They are about relaxing, reflecting, playful tinkering, and being sucked into the story and aesthetics (often referred to as "wholesome" or "cozy").

"Please, Touch The Artwork", released January 26th 2022 on Steam and mobile and September 3rd 2022 on Nintendo Switch, was Thomas's first big solo project. It's a cozy puzzle game about touching abstract paintings (from Mondrian and the Style) and finding out what happens. It has received several awards and international nominations such as the Google Play Indie award 2022, Apple Design Award nomination, 2 Belgian Game Awards, and a Tokyo Game Show Best Art award. The game was also featured in '2022's best of'-lists in The Guardian and Eurogamer.

The sequel "Please, Touch The Artwork 2" was released February 19th 2024 on Steam and mobile and May 23rd on Nintendo Switch. It's a hidden object adventure set in the paintings of James Ensor. The game was created with the support of the Flemish Government on the occasion of the Belgian EU Presidency 2024. It was downloaded over 700.000 times, with 6000 overwhelmingly positive reviews, making it the 13th best rated game of Steam in 2024.

History

Inspiration

Inspired by Pietro Righi Riva’s manifesto Rejecta, Thomas Waterzooi founded Studio Waterzooi. The manifest aims to provide guidelines to develop games for a new audience. He (and Thomas) want to advance the medium in a certain direction that makes it interesting to people that are not normally interested in video games but have other interests such as art, culture, humanity..etc (or are interested but don’t find games about specific topics that interest them). We have to cater to these people and learn how to make games for them so games can eventually become the art-form it deserves to be.

Stories

Conflict is a part of every good story, but it doesn’t have to be the only part. Entertainment is about being immersed and triggering emotions, not only about having fun. We focus on creating shorter experiences that are still impactful (because of the typical time-shortages tied to adult life). The success of pc-games like ‘Firewatch’, ‘Life Is Strange’, ‘What Remains of Edith Finch’ or mobile titles like ‘Monument Valley’ and ‘Florence’ tells us that there is a market for these slice of life experiences.

Projects

• Please Touch The Artwork
• Please Touch The Artwork 2

Team

Thomas Waterzooi
Design & Development

Contact

Inquiries
info@studiowaterzooi.com

Newsletter
studiowaterzooi.com/subscribe

Discord
discord.gg/vtjnWtZ6UA