Pitbull Syndicate was formed in December 1996 by an ensemble of programmers and artists with extensive experience in the video game industry. The company started with a small office in
Sunderland, England, and initially employed eight people, working on PC and
PlayStation games. Slowly expanding, the company moved to larger offices in
Chester-le-Street and later to larger offices in
Gateshead. By 2005, its staff had swelled to over 60 people working on PC, PlayStation 2 and
Xbox. In October 2005, the company was sold to
Midway Games and were renamed Midway Studios – Newcastle. Prior to that, Pitbull had created the titles
L.A. Rush and
Rush for Midway. It was Midway's only studio located outside the U.S. and was closed in July 2009 after the sale of most of Midway's assets to
Warner Bros. A game called
Necessary Force was being developed at the time of the closure. The rights to the game have diverted back to Midway Games as they are shopping the intellectual property. Some members of the team were able to band together and form a new company, Atomhawk Design. In July 2010, Robert Troughton, founder of Pitbull Syndicate, announced the formation of
Pitbull Studio, one year after Midway folded the renamed company. Troughton also said that an unannounced project was in development. == Games developed ==