Lionhead Creative Director Gary Carr Departs

Gary Carr, a longstanding creative director at Lionhead, has left the company after a twelve-year stretch.

A Microsoft spokesperson has confirmed Carr's departure in a statement issued to GameSpot, stating that "Gary has been a great friend and colleague during his tenure at Lionhead."

In his final years at Lionhead, Carr appeared to be overseeing prototype game ideas and new IP concepts at the Guildford studio. In 2014, Lionhead studio boss John Needham described the incubation initiative as "a team of about eight guys we have in the studio who are trying to build the next big IP for us."

How successful those incubation projects have been is unclear. Lionhead is presently focused on Fable Legends, the free-to-play action RPG in development for PC and Xbox One. The project has yet to be given a public release date.

“We can confirm that Gary Carr, who played a lead role in Fable: The Journey, Milo & Kate, and The Movies, is no longer at Lionhead Studios," a Microsoft spokesperson told GameSpot.

"Gary has been a great friend and colleague during his tenure at Lionhead, and we appreciate his contributions to the team. We remain focused on the development of Fable Legends and have nothing further to share. We wish Gary the best in his next venture.”

GameSpot understands that Carr is establishing his own independent studio.

He joined Bullfrog Productions in 1989, and left just before Electronic Arts acquired the studio in 1995. He then joined three other key Bullfrog developers who had opened an independent studio, called Muckyfoot, in Guidford.

Muckyfoot's first project was Urban Chaos, an action adventure game that shipped on PC, Dreamcast, and PlayStation 1.

He then joined Lionhead in 2003, and became its most senior developer after Peter Molyneux departed in 2012. In April 2013, Lionhead announced that John Needham--formerly the head of MMO dev Gazillion--had been appointed studio head.