Pixel Maniacs

The history of Pixel Maniacs shows how varied the path into the gaming industry can be: founder Benjamin Lochmann started a web agency at the age of 17. The first employees joined the company through the development of apps. Together, they attended game jams, where the idea for their first joint game was born: Chromagun. By the time Chromagun was released in 2016, the course for PM had been set: full speed ahead into the gaming industry!

Today, Pixel Maniacs has released two games of its own, is working on a third, and has founded the Indie Outpost Community together with the studio Gentle Troll to give game developers in Franconia a home. Regular events with talks, networking, and game jams help the local scene to network and further their education. Pixel Maniacs also enjoys sharing its knowledge, whether through short videos on TikTok for its 88,000 followers or the regular school workshops on game development that it gives.

But Pixel Maniacs’ commitment doesn’t end there: they have received €640,000 in EU funding for innovative business tools for their own influencer marketing tool. They are also campaigning for greater recognition and education about video games in politics by inviting politicians to the coworking space they founded in Nuremberg.

But the Pixel Maniacs don’t just invest time in young talent: in 2024, they bought shares in the Bengal-Hesse studio Vidribute. This marked the beginning of a collaboration in which Pixel Maniacs provides strategic advice, network reach, and proprietary tools, while Vidribute provides QA and other services in addition to working on its own project.

Such a diverse and long-standing commitment to the German games industry, alongside their successful party racing game Can’t Drive This, makes Pixel Maniacs a shining example for the German indie dev scene.