Click to slide down
Home » Grow » Sector Growth » Ambitious Essex Tech 50 » Ambitious Essex Tech 50 – 2026 » Dlala Studios
Dlala studios is a BAFTA-nominated independent game studio originally formed in a garage in Witham, Essex in June 2012. The studio now has 40+ full-time staff members, with its own premises within Witham and has made award-winning titles such as Battletoads (2020) and Disney Illusion Island Starring Mickey + Friends. Dlala Studios has partnered with some of the biggest companies in the world including Microsoft, Nintendo, Disney, Amazon and more.
At the start of 2025, after 2 years of exclusivity to the Nintendo Switch, Disney Illusion Island Starring Mickey + Friends was ported and launched on new platforms, including Steam, Playstation 5 and Xbox Series S/X. Alongside this the studio has been ramping up with additional team members, and working on an unannounced new title.
Dlala Studios will be continuing work on the new title, with a view to announce it in the first half of 2026.
Yes completely. I’m obviously completely biased as I grew up here and have run Dlala from Essex for nearly its entirety. I feel like Essex has a fantastic creative culture across the arts, video games and music. It’s also got access to a main trainline, the A12 and a couple of international airports. This allows us the flexibility of accessing major cities without the cost and overpopulation that come along with being based directly out of the capital.
Whilst the title hasn’t yet been announced, we’re happy to say that we’re working on our first original IP title in a decade currently.
Honestly this question is almost impossible to answer. Being completely honest I think anyone that tells you that can predict the next 5-10 months of the games industry is lying. What I can say is that the last couple of years have been tough on the industry a lot of lay-offs, project cancellations and studio closures. However, we have also seen a lot of creativity and independently produced titles coming out of the ashes of this from Dispatch to Expedition 33 and more. I imagine over the next decade the industry will keep evolving and shifting, we’ll see an equal amount of successes in the AAA and indie spaces, and regretfully further closures and lay-offs.
There are two pieces of advice I can give. If you’re looking to join the industry to actual make the games themselves then start making them now. Work on your portfolio, look online and at school to find similar minded people and make projects together. Work with your friends, or even better work with people you don’t like so that you get used to the reality that great collaboration doesn’t have to be built on friendship as long as there is mutual respect.
The second is if you want to get into the industry but don’t feel you have any of the ‘traditional’ skills, such as programming, art, design etc… then it’s worth looking into all the other roles that our industry contains. IT and Infrastructure, Operations, Accounting etc…. all are just as important to the creation of video games as the people making the projects. Without our cleaning lady Julie coming in and doing a deep clean before visits we wouldn’t make the lasting impressions we do on our guests. Just because you don’t have certain skills doesn’t mean you can’t still work in an industry you love.
I’d love to take credit for this, but the credit really goes to the team. First of all my amazing C-Suite who work hard every day to make sure that Dlala is one of the best places in the industry to work, putting our team first in every decision we make whether it be financial or strategic. Then the credit goes to the team, Dlala’s culture is permanently evolving, and every new Dlalan that joins adds and amends our culture. If we’d stayed as we were when it was the 5 of us in the early days we wouldn’t be half the company we are now.
I’ve been very lucky that we’ve been able to work on a childhood franchise that I loved, in Battletoads (2020), and then in one of my all-time favourite franchises with Mickey and Friends, Disney Illusion island. There is a lot of IP out there we love that we’d like to do something with from Star Wars to Bluey to Thundercats to Rayman. We’re always meeting with and chatting with awesome people on potential collaborations that would make sense for both parties!But as long as we’re making games we love, with people we love, for people to love then I’ll be happy.
Visit Dlala Studios
