Bossa

The second half of 2022 was full of change for Mei Semones. The musician had just moved to a new city, New York. She was falling in love as she began a new relationship while also ending a close friendship, and she was adjusting to the unglamorous realities of adulthood after having graduated from Berklee College of Music that spring.  “It was a transition period of my life,” says Semones, who struggled to find time for creativity now that she had a full-time job at a Japanese preschool. “I was trying to work on…

Bossa Studios--the team behind I Am Bread and the Surgeon Simulator series--has reportedly laid off 19 employees. That is roughly one-third of the company's workforce, with 40 people left to make the cooperative survival-adventure game Lost Skies.GamesIndustry.biz confirmed the firings at Bossa Studios, with co-founder Henrique Olifiers saying the cutbacks are because of a "perfect storm of events." Olifiers cited rising operational costs, funding decisions being pushed back in the industry, and big…

Astrud Gilberto, whose dreamy interpretation of The Girl from Ipanema became the most popular version of the song, has died aged 83.Paul Ricci, a collaborator with Gilberto, confirmed the news on social media, writing that he had been asked to announce it by Gilberto’s son Marcelo. “She was an important part of ALL that is Brazilian music in the world and she changed many lives with her energy,” he added.Born in 1940 in the Brazilian state of Bahia and raised in Rio de Janeiro, Astrud Weinert married musician João…

In 1959, Carlos Lyra’s musical partner and lyricist Ronaldo Bôscoli said that bossa nova is a state of mind. Lyra thought he was talking nonsense. “Today, I’m actually agreeing with him,” he reflects more than six decades later, while vividly narrating a flashback of the genre’s early days in 1950s Rio de Janeiro. “With our guitars and bottles of homemade drinks, we used to go to the beach at sunset and stay singing through the night. The next day, we would do it all over again. It was a joyous, carefree atmosphere.”Lyra,…

Russian studio Konfa Games also acquired American Publisher tinyBuild Inc, following a particularly expensive morning, has announced that it has acquired several IPs from indie studio Bossa Games. As reported by GamesIndustry.biz, the memeriffic “comedy physics” titles Surgeon Simulator, I am Bread, and I am Fish were purchased by tinyBuild for an “upfront payment” of $3 million USD. Following the closure of this purchase, tinyBuild will now manage developmental control of all three titles, while Bossa Studios will move…

American publisher TinyBuild has acquired a selection of Bossa Studios’ games for $3million (roughly £2.5million). Additionally, Russian Studio Konfa Games has also been acquired by the publisher for $5.4million (roughly £4.2million).  The intellectual property in question includes Surgeon Simulator, I Am Fish, and I Am Bread, with the payment being upfront. This means that TinyBuild will also act as the developer for these games moving forward. Meanwhile, Konfa Games will be joining TinyBuild’s studio in Belgrad,…