Ghost of Tsushima Studio Sucker Punch’s Co-Founder Brian Fleming Steps Down

Sucker Punch co-founder Brian Fleming is stepping down n the new year after three decades at the studio behind Ghost of Tsushima, Sly Cooper, and Infamous.

According to a post from Sony, on January 1, Jason Connell and Adrian Bentley will step into Fleming’s former role as co-studio heads, with Nate Fox continuing his role as co-creative director alongside Connell and Adrian also serving as technical director.

https://twitter.com/PlayStation/status/2000974662071627958?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Fleming first founded the studio in 1997 alongside Bruce Oberg, Darrell Plank, Tom and Cathy Saxton, and Chris Zimmerman following a stint at Microsoft. The group went on to start the Sly Cooper franchise, which Sony published. The two companies continued their publishing relationship into the Infamous series in 2009, and after the sequel Infamous 2 in 2011, Sony acquired Sucker Punch. Under Sony, the studio created Ghost of Tsushima in 2020, and most recently followed up with a sequel, Ghost of Yōtei, this past October. With Fleming’s departure, only Oberg and Zimmerman of the co-founders remain with the studio.

Connell and Bentley are long-time Sucker Punch veterans. Connell joined the studio in 2010 as a lighting artist and worked his way up to lighting director and eventually creative and art director, and recently co-creative director on the Ghost franchise. Bentley came to Sucker Punch as a programmer in 2004 fresh out of DigiPen Institute of Technology, and has worked there his entire career, moving up to become an engine programmer and later technical director.

Fleming hands off Sucker Punch in what seems from the outside to be a pretty positive state. The studio’s had multiple successful games both critically and commercially, with Ghost of Yōtei recently reviewing well (including our own 8/10 score) and selling 3.3 million copies as of November 2. An added New Game Plus mode just released a few weeks ago. It’s unclear what Sucker Punch will work on next under Connell and Bentley, or if the Ghost franchise will continue or something new is on the horizon for the studio.

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.