LONDON (Alliance News) - Video-game developer Frontier Developments PLC on Monday said it has started developing a new self-published game that will run as a second-franchise alongside the company's existing Elite:Dangerous title.

The new self-published game, Coaster Park Tycoon, follows on from Frontier's development of Tycoon games as part of the RollerCoaster Tycoon franchise and is set to be released in 2016 on personal computer.

"This will run as a second franchise alongside continued development of its existing self-published Elite:Dangerous title, and marks the next stage in Frontier?s transition towards increasing its proportion of self-published revenue," said Frontier.

With the company focusing on two self-published franchises, Frontier is re-focusing its development activities and staff roles to Cambridge in Ontario, Canada, where "expertise in these franchises lies", from Halifax, Nova Scotia.

Content creation roles will be moved from Halifax to Cambridge. However, 15 of those roles have been made redundant in Cambridge to "match the needs of the two projects", from a total of 281 staff. Frontier said it continues to recruit in areas such as game and technology programming and server and web front end development.

"Frontier has unparalleled expertise and immense passion, and one to which we have long wanted to make a ?no-holds-barred? return. We want Coaster Park Tycoon to be another major step forward for the simulation genre, and sit alongside Elite:Dangerous as a second major self-published franchise," said Chief Creative Officer Jonny Watts.

Frontier shares were untraded on Monday, last trading at 235.00 pence per share.

By Joshua Warner; joshuawarner@alliancenews.com; @JoshAlliance

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