Outcast is created by an amazing team of world-class developers. The studio Appeal is founded in 1995 and headed by Yann Robert and Franck Sauer with support from Yves Grolet as gameplay advisor. In December 2015 , these developers (re)founded the studio Appeal.The team has a significant experience in developing games for PC and consoles and has worked on several shipped games on PC, PS2, Xbox 360 and Xbox One. Most members from the original core team are still present and working at Appeal this very day.
Yann Robert, Project Manager/Programmer
I am CEO and Technical Director at Fresh3D. For over 26 years, I have been developping and trying to push the limits of the hardware on the various platforms I had the chance to work on Amiga, PC, PS2, PSP, PSVita, PS3, X360, XB1, PS4. I like this alchemy between art, technology and gameplay.
It all started at Ubi Soft in 1987 where I put my hand on a Commodore 64 and never left the industry till then. My first game released was ‘Unreal’ on Amiga in 1990. Then, during 3 years, I developed several coin-up games on our own designed hardware board, the most successful was ‘Ultimate Tennis’. In 1995, I co-founded Appeal and was Technical Director on Outcast. Among the games I’ve worked on, Outcast is certainly the one I am the most proud of. I truly believe that players feel the passion you put in the game while developing it.
Franck Sauer, Art Director/Technical Artist
I’m Co-Owner and Creative Director at Fresh3d and was co-director on the original Outcast. I have over 26 years of industry experience, and you can read details about all the games I’ve been working on at my website francksauer.com
I love video games. Like many, I like playing them, but my real passion is about making them. To me, video games is the most creative and complete form of entertainment. It combines all other forms of entertainment and adds interactivity on top. What makes me tick is the intricate combination of art and technology that is required to make a game. I love to make visuals, sounds and music, write stories, develop universes and implement interactions. Don’t we have two brains? Maybe we’ve been designed to make games!
Yves Grolet, Project Manager/Programmer
I started my career In the eighties with the creation of my first commercial games for the Commodore 64 and the Amiga. Those games were ‘No’, ‘Iron Lord’, ‘Unreal’ and ‘Agony’.
The success of these products gave me the opportunity to start two game development companies, the first one was dedicated to coin-op game development and the second one was Appeal, the company that created Outcast.
In 2001, I embarked on a new adventure, Elsewhere Entertainment, a game development studio focused on innovations in game design and game production excellence. After several products, this was followed by the creation of AMA Studios, a Belgian game development company linked to Ubisoft and focused on motion gaming.
Michaël Defroyennes, Environment Artist
From 1993 to 1997, I started my career as a 2D/3D artist at Art&Magic on several sprite-based coin-op games, like ‘Stone Ball’, ‘Western Shooting’ and ‘Cheese Chase’. From 1997 to 2002, I joined Appeal to work on Characters, animations, environments and concepts for Outcast and Outcast2. Then I joined 10Tacle Studio Belgium, working on projects like ‘David Douillet Judo’ (animations and motion capture) and ‘Totems’ (art direction). From 2008 to 2013 I worked at Softkinetic Studios (art director) on several gesture games, like ‘Silhouette’, ‘DanceWall’, ‘Kickers FC’, or ‘Sorcerers’ Apprentice’ (product for the marketing campaign at the launch of the Walt Disney Pictures movie). After I joined AMA Studios as a freelance artist, to collaborate on the environments and Interface assets for the Game ‘Fighter Within’, published at end 2013 by Ubisoft. Since 2008 I’m also a teacher in the video-games group at the Albert Jacquard University College in Namur.
François-Xavier Melard, Character Artist
With a passion for drawing, comics, and video games since a very young age, it was quite natural for me to embrace an artistic career. When 3D modeling software became available on PCs in the mid-nineties, I was hooked for life. I started in the industry as a 3D artist, but quickly specialized in character sculpting and texturing. I now have about 15 years of experience in the game industry. I worked for studios in Belgium (Appeal, AMA Studios/Daoka), US (Liquid Development), Australia (Krome Studios), and UK (Microsoft), on IPs like Starwars, Outcast, Hellboy, Dungeon and Dragons, Guildwars, to name a few. I have recently worked on the XBox One game Fighter Within as lead character Artist, responsible of the production pipeline (Art and Tech) and the management of the team. I like to share my passion as instructor at the Albert Jacquard University College in Namur.
Other members of the current Appeal team
- Raphael Ernaelsten – Technical Artist
- Marion Kivits – Environment Artist
- Abner Marín – Character Artist
- Guillaume Aliquot – Animator