How an Outsourcing Studio Works in Creating Art and Game Development

Introduction

There were a few layers behind my decision to strike out on my own. First, after spending many years at Riot, especially working deeply on VALORANT, I felt I had reached a natural milestone. I joined the project when the team was just around 10 people and stayed all the way through to public launch, by which point the team had grown to more than 150.

After completing that journey, I felt ready to challenge myself with something new. Second, my wife and I were expecting our first child, and we wanted to move back to Sweden and be closer to family. That life change gave me the push to take a bigger leap. And third, over the years, I had built a very broad set of experiences, working in game development at Riot, collaborating with outsourcing teams, and also freelancing.

At the same time, my network had grown a lot, and I'd had the opportunity to work with many talented creatives across different teams and studios. All of that made me feel ready to build something of my own, shaped with my own vision and values. You only live once, and I did not want to carry the regret of never trying.

As for the founding vision of Envar, I would say it has stayed surprisingly consistent since day one: to create the best working environment in our field, and to produce the best work in the world. As we have grown from 32 to around 200 team members, that vision has become even more important.

The larger the studio becomes, the more intentional you have to be about culture and alignment, especially in a remote environment. Every studio is different, but beyond hard skills, the right cultural fit and mindset are critical if you want to scale without losing quality.

What I also love is that we are still actively learning new things every day and constantly improving how we work as a team. I think one of our biggest strengths is our flexibility as a company. We adapt fast, we learn quickly, and we keep evolving as a studio.

Strengths

I believe one of our key strengths, and what truly sets us apart, is our expertise in stylized work. Even though the industry went through significant turbulence in 2025, and we will likely see more of that in 2026, our service business has continued to perform strongly. We have strengthened many of our existing client relationships while also growing through new ones.

What we are seeing is that clients are more selective than before, but when they find a partner they trust, they consolidate more work into fewer studios. That has worked in our favor. In terms of demand, 2D has remained a consistently strong area for us, especially concept development and illustration.

At the same time, we have grown significantly on the 3D side, particularly in characters, environments, and very exciting tech art. Clients are increasingly looking for partners that can deliver across multiple disciplines with high consistency, strong production, and clear communication.

And looking forward, with our own game shipping this year, if it lands well with players, it will open up a completely new side of the business for Envar. That is something I am extremely excited about, because it strengthens both our long-term vision and our credibility as a full studio, not only a service partner.

I believe strong long-term client relationships are built through consistent hard work over many years. Trust is not something you can shortcut, it comes from repeatedly delivering at a high level, communicating clearly, and showing that you understand the bigger picture, not just your own part of the work.

With Riot, the situation is somewhat unique, as I spent nearly six years working onsite with the company. That experience gave me a deep understanding of their culture, their quality bar, and their approach to development. Over time, that mindset naturally became part of how we built Envar as well.

In general, I think the transition from being a vendor to becoming an extension of an internal team happens when you stop acting like an external supplier and start behaving like a true partner. That means taking ownership, thinking proactively, and caring about the result as much as the client does.

If I had to point to one defining factor behind it, it would be teamwork. The strength of a studio is not just individual talent, it is how well a team collaborates, aligns, and delivers consistently together. That is what builds trust at the highest level.

Achievements

A lot of exciting things happened in 2025, with both major milestones and smaller wins. If I narrow it down to a few that really stood out to me personally, there are three key highlights. First, our relationship with Epic became extremely strong. Trust and collaboration grew significantly, and our team has become genuinely excellent at delivering at a very high level.

It is always exciting to see the work being produced there, and I am very proud of the consistency and quality we have achieved. Second, our internal game development made solid progress. The game advanced according to plan, and we managed to stay on schedule throughout the year without unexpected setbacks.

That might not sound dramatic, but in game development, maintaining a stable timeline is a huge achievement and reflects strong production discipline across the team. Third, our journey as a public company was a major milestone. We became publicly traded on December 16, 2024, and 2025 was our first full year on the stock market. It was the first time for me personally going through that process, and it has been an incredible experience.

Envar has also been the most successful IPO on the Swedish stock market over the past two years, which I am extremely proud of. To me, this reflects not only the hard work and performance of our team, but also the trust we have earned externally, from clients, investors, and everyone who has joined us on this journey.

Team Structure and Work

For us, quality is everything. It is the foundation of the brand we have built and the reason clients trust us with long-term work. So we are very intentional about not only having strong talent, but also creating real ownership around the work being produced, supported by the right structure.

From a team perspective, we focus heavily on specialization. We build teams around clearly defined disciplines with strong leadership in each area, and we ensure artists are supported by experienced leads, art direction, and production. That combination allows us to scale without compromising the quality bar.

On the production side, we put a lot of care into every stage of the process. It starts with initial discussions with the client and making sure we fully understand their goals, pipeline, and expectations. From there, we set up each project properly from day one, with a clear scope, schedule, communication routines, and review cycles.

We prioritize consistent updates, transparent communication, and on-time delivery because reliability is just as important as the visuals. Ultimately, delivering at the level clients like Riot and Epic expect requires more than great artists. It requires strong leadership, strong production, and a culture where everyone takes pride in what they create and continuously pushes to improve.

Balancing a thriving service business with internal game development definitely adds complexity, but we have approached it very intentionally. The most important thing is separation and focus. Our service business runs as its own structured operation, with dedicated leadership, clear production pipelines, and stable client teams.

This allows us to maintain extremely high quality and reliability without constantly pulling attention away from the rest of the company. Our game development is also structured as its own dedicated team, with its own roadmap, planning, and production cadence. We do not treat it as a side project. It is a real long-term investment, built with the same discipline and quality mindset that we apply to client work.

Many lessons from services have been incredibly valuable in developing our own title. Services work teaches you world-class fundamentals: strong production management, clear communication, accurate scoping, and consistently hitting deadlines. It also teaches you how important review cycles, polish, and quality control really are. 

I would also say services have shaped our culture. We are used to high expectations, iteration, and delivering at a professional level. That gives us a huge advantage as we transition into being a studio that not only supports other developers but also builds our own original IP.

I think there are many reasons why a studio might choose one partner over another. Sometimes it simply comes down to cost. Sometimes it is a very specific style match. Other times, it is about speed, pipeline, or capacity. For Envar, quality is always the starting point, but it is not the only reason clients work with us. I believe our real differentiation is how we work as a partner.

We focus heavily on communication, reliability, and ownership. Clients know that we will not only deliver strong work, but will also help ensure the project runs smoothly. We also have a strong specialization in stylized art, and we have built a team and pipeline capable of delivering that style consistently at scale.

That matters a lot, because many studios can produce great work occasionally, but not many can do it consistently with the same quality bar across larger teams and long timelines. And yes, my background at Riot helped shape our culture, standards, and approach to collaboration.

But ultimately, the reason clients keep coming back and expanding the partnership is trust. They feel that we operate like an extension of their team, not just a vendor. That is how we win projects against other strong studios.

Challenges in the Gaming Industry

As you scale, the challenges change completely. The problems you face at 30 people are very different from those at 60, and then again at 120 or 200. Everything becomes more complex: communication, consistency, culture, quality control, and leadership structure.

For us, organic growth has always been a clear goal. That means growing in a way where we could protect quality, culture, and long-term stability, rather than simply chasing headcount. With rapid growth, there will always be some growing pains, but what matters is how you handle them. We focus on addressing issues quickly, openly, and as a team.

Hiring has been one of the most important parts. We look for strong talent, but we place huge value on mindset and cultural alignment. Skills matter, but attitude and the ability to collaborate are what make a studio sustainable, especially in a remote environment.

Onboarding and development are also key. As the company grows, you cannot rely on "everyone just figuring it out." We invest in structure, leadership, and clear processes so that new team members can succeed quickly, learn our standards, and feel connected to the culture.

One of our biggest strengths is flexibility. We adapt quickly, and we are not afraid to improve and adjust. At the same time, we are constantly building a stable foundation for the future so that growth does not come at the cost of quality.

My view is that many of the layoffs, shutdowns, and cancellations we have seen are the result of the Covid-era boom. During that period, many studios were created or scaled extremely quickly due to massive investment, but a large number of those teams ultimately failed to build products that players actually wanted.

When that happens at scale, it affects the entire industry, and as a result, raising capital in games has become much more difficult. That is sad to see, especially for passionate teams that are trying to build something great. I also believe we will see more turbulence in 2026.

Some companies that raised capital in the last wave are now reaching the end of their runway, and they either need to release a product successfully, raise again in a very difficult market, or shut down. That said, for more established studios, the focus has shifted heavily toward efficiency and cost control. In that environment, high-quality external development becomes extremely valuable.

Working with a trusted external partner allows studios to scale up and down much faster than hiring internally. In countries like Sweden, full-time hiring can easily take three to six months, but production needs often appear on much shorter timelines. Many studios need work to start within one to four weeks. That is where strong service studios thrive.

We can move quickly, integrate smoothly into existing pipelines, and deliver high-quality work without adding long-term overhead for the client. So while parts of the industry are under pressure, I believe the high-end game art services sector is still healthy, especially for studios that are reliable and capable of long-term partnership.

Conclusion

I believe the game art outsourcing industry will continue to grow in importance through 2026 and beyond, but it will also become more competitive and more professionalized. Studios are under increasing pressure to move faster, control costs, and remain flexible. This pushes more work toward external development, but it also changes how outsourcing works.

Clients are moving away from having many small vendor relationships and instead consolidating into fewer, long-term partnerships with studios they trust. So I think the future of outsourcing is less about one-off deliveries and more about deep integration. Clients will expect external teams to plug into pipelines smoothly, align on quality and style, communicate at a high level, and deliver reliably over extended periods of time.

For Envar, that is exactly how we are positioning ourselves: as a long-term partner, not just a supplier. We invest heavily in production structure, disciplined leadership, and quality control so we can scale across multiple areas without losing consistency. We also focus on being easy to work with, because at the top tier, reliability, communication, and ownership become just as important as the art itself.

At the same time, we are entering what I believe is the most exciting year in the company's history. We are launching our own game this year, which is a major milestone for us. It is a year that will define our future steps ahead and strengthen the company on every level, creatively, strategically, and long-term.

In the next three to five years, I think the biggest opportunity for studios like Envar is to take on larger scopes and more responsibility within client production. The greatest challenge will be differentiation, because many studios can claim quality, but very few can deliver consistently at scale with strong production and long-term trust.

Envar Studio

Interview conducted by 80 Level