Vlambeer is a Dutch independent game company based in Utrecht. It was started in 2010 by Rami Ismail and Jan Willem Nijman. The company is known for creating games such as Super Crate Box (2010), Serious Sam: The Random Encounter (2011), Ridiculous Fishing (2013), Luftrausers (2014), and Nuclear Throne (2015). It is also known for fighting against the copying of video games.

History

Vlambeer was founded in 2010 by Rami Ismail and Jan Willem Nijman. Both had dropped out of a game design course at the Utrecht School of the Arts. According to Ismail, they were making a game outside of school. When the school found out, it asked for the rights to the game. They refused, which led them to leave the course. Ismail and Nijman began working together to develop a prototype called "Crates from Hell." It was released on 11 May 2010 as Super Crate Box. This game earned the studio recognition as an Independent Games Festival finalist in the Excellence in Design category. During the development of Super Crate Box, Vlambeer also created Radical Fishing, which was released in November 2010. Radical Fishing was the first of many games released by the studio under a "Not Vlambeer" label. This label includes games made for money or as experiments.

Vlambeer was approached by publisher Devolver Digital to develop a game in the Serious Sam franchise. The studio and Devolver Digital agreed to make a turn-based role-playing game. The result, Serious Sam: The Random Encounter, was released on 24 October 2011. During its development, Vlambeer released many small games, including Luftrauser. Vlambeer started working on an iOS version of Radical Fishing called Ridiculous Fishing. Development was stopped after a San Francisco-based studio released a similar game on iOS. This situation led to discussions about copying video games and made Vlambeer a symbol of the issue. The term "Vlambeer'd" was used by media outlets to describe this situation. In November 2013, the browser game Vlambeer Clone Tycoon was released. It was a satirical comment on the cloning issue.

In February 2012, Vlambeer released Gun Godz, a first-person shooter inspired by hip-hop, in collaboration with Brandon Boyer's Venus Patrol. Ridiculous Fishing was nominated for the 2012 Independent Games Festival "Best Mobile" award. At the conference where the award was given, Vlambeer released Yeti Hunter.

On 2 December 2012, Vlambeer announced a sequel to Luftrauser called Luftrausers. On 19 December 2012, the iOS version of Super Crate Box was released. Its success helped the studio avoid financial problems caused by the cloning incident. On 14 March 2013, Ridiculous Fishing was released on iOS after development resumed.

In 2015, Vlambeer experimented with live streaming their development process. At one point, they had over 12,000 paid subscriptions to their Twitch channel.

On 5 December 2015, Vlambeer released Nuclear Throne, a top-down shooter roguelike. It had been in Steam's early access program since 2013. The game was released for Microsoft Windows, OS X, Linux, PlayStation 4, and PlayStation Vita. It received positive reviews from users.

On 8 August 2016, Vlambeer announced 120 Years Of Vlambeer And Friends. This was an art and history book about the company, written by Arjan Terpstra and published by Cook & Becker. It brought back arcade games since 1896.

In March 2018, Ismail received the Ambassador Award at the Game Developers Choice Awards for supporting independent video game development through Vlambeer and other activities.

On 1 September 2020, the tenth anniversary of the studio's formation, Vlambeer announced it would close. Ismail and Nijman had decided to end the studio a few weeks earlier. They had recognized they were moving in different directions in the video game industry since 2016. They planned to release a final game called Ultrabugs, which had not been released as of July 2024. Ismail plans to continue supporting diversity in the video game industry, while Nijman expects to help develop smaller games like Minit with other teams.

In April 2024, Ismail sold his shares of the company to Nijman, giving him full ownership. Nijman reopened the studio, planning to improve existing games and complete Ultrabugs after finishing his current unannounced project outside the Vlambeer label.

Games

• Super Crate Box (2010)
• Karate (2011)
• Serious Sam: The Random Encounter (2011)
• Gun Godz (2012)
• Yeti Hunter (2012)
• Ridiculous Fishing (2013)
• Luftrausers (2014)
• Nuclear Throne (2015)
• Ultrabugs (TBA)
• Ridiculous Fishing EX (2023)