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Hero Concept is an independent Turkish video game developer located in İstanbul, Turkey, founded in 2017. The studio has released two arcade remakes (as of November 2019), both of which take place within the Doughlings franchise. The headquarters are located in the Erenköy neighborhood on the Asian side of the city. Hero Concept was the first Turkish video game company developing games on the Nintendo Switch platform.
Hero Concept was founded by designer Serkan Özay, a Peak Games alum, and programmer Turgut Hakkı Özdemir, a 20+ year veteran of the industry, with an angel investment from serial entrepreneur Arif Obdan. The studio's first release was the Brick breaker/Arkanoid remake Doughlings: Arcade and it was released on Steam, Switch, and Xbox One in the summer of 2018 followed by the PS4 release in May 2019.
On February 5, 2019 Hero Concept received further seed funding from Tunç Yalgın, an early investor to Gram Games, and Sinan Tahan, corporate lawyer and former board member of STFA Group. The studio released its second game Doughlings: Invasion, a space invaders remake, on Xbox One on July 10. The release was announced the previous month by Major Nelson, the Director of Programming for Microsoft's gaming network Xbox Live on June 19, 2019, on his personal website and later on his Twitter account. The PS4 version was announced by a guest blog post Sony invited Hero Concept to contribute on the PlayStation Blog website. The PC and the PS4 versions came out on August 1st, 2019, and the Switch version on August 8, 2019. Concurrent with the release of Doughlings: Invasion, Hero Concept also released Doughlings Bundle on every platform where gamers are able to buy both games together at a discounted price.Shortly before the release of Doughlings: Invasion Paris Obdan, who had been an advisor since the early days, contributed further funding and came on board as an executive, bringing with him serial entrepreneur Eren Merzeci of Nişfud as an advisor and a board member.
During the fundraising roadshow for the project, Bora Koçyiğit, Co-Founder of GAMI Technology, decided to join the Hero Concept team both as an investor and a board member. The company announced its third project Mayhem Brawler, an Urban fantasy-themed Beat 'em Up game on the 4th of November 2020. The title was released on Steam, Xbox, Nintendo Switch, and PS4 on August 19th, 2021, followed by the iiRcade release on September 29th, 2021.
On May 8, 2018, LeveL, the longest-running video gaming magazine in Turkey, published an interview with Hero Concept's creative director Serkan Özay on their web platform LEVEL Online.
- Doughlings: Arcade (2018)
- Doughlings: Invasion (2019)
- Mayhem Brawler (2021)