Company aims to strengthen video quality, production efficiency with acquisition
Cygames announced on its Japanese website on Friday that it has acquired all shares of 3DCG animation and visual effects production house Griot Groove. The company aims to improve its current video production and quality with the acquisition.
Image via Cygames’ official website
© Cygames, Inc., 2016 Griot Groove inc.
Griot Groove was founded in in 1996 and produces CG animation and motion capture work across the industry including games, movies, commercials, and anime. It has previously worked on titles such as Attack on Titan Final Season THE FINAL CHAPTERS, Chainsaw Man, Tokyo Ghoul, and others.
The company established an AI production company in Japan and Spain called Black Relic in 2023.
Cygames Pictures became a consolidated subsidiary of media advertising company CyberAgent on February 27. Cygames Pictures changed its name to Cypic to reflect this change on April 6 and mark Cygames Pictures’ 10th anniversary on April 5. The company previously served as a subsidiary of CyberAgent’s subsidiary Cygames.
Cygames founded its Cygames AI Studio in December. The subsidiary plans to research, develop, and provide secure and efficient access to AI technology for game creators. The company aims to “show the industry what creative minds can do” with AI. Its office is in Shibuya in Tokyo, and Eitoshi Ashihara serves as the CEO. Masaru Kanai and Shuichi Kurabayashi are directors, and Ryohei Okuma is an auditor. The company said that art produced from generative Al is not used in its current products, and that it “won’t implement generative AI into our products without prior notice.”
In April 2024, CyberAgent created in-house guidelines for its creators for using generative AI/large language models for images, aimed at avoiding violations of copyright law and highlighting that current generative AI cannot produce a usable end product as-is.
CyberAgent established its AI Lab group in 2016, and it debuted its first large language model based on Japanese in May 2023. The company established an AI-focused business unit focused on game development named “Game AI Lab” in October 2023, as well as the “Animation AI Lab” business unit for animation production in the same month.
Cygames established its Global Business Development team in 2017, followed by its first overseas branches in South Korea and Taiwan. The company established its United States-based Cygames America branch, as well as its London-based Cygames Europe branch, in April 2023. Cygames established the Cygames Singapore overseas branch in May 2024.
Sources: Cygames’ Japanese website, Anime Business Journal (Tadashi Sudo)
