Iron Galaxy

Iron Galaxy is an American independent video game developer founded in 2008 by Dave Lang and Adam Boyes in Chicago, Illinois. The studio built its reputation as a reliable co-developer and porting specialist before expanding into original titles. Their work spans fighting games, battle royales, and high-profile ports across major franchises including Killer Instinct, Borderlands, and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater.

Killer Instinct and Fighting Games

Iron Galaxy’s most significant early project was Killer Instinct, the Microsoft-published fighting game that relaunched the classic Rare franchise as a free-to-play Xbox One launch title in 2013. Double Helix developed the first season before Microsoft handed the game to Iron Galaxy, who developed Season 2 and Season 3 and continued supporting it through its PC release and ongoing updates. Iron Galaxy built a reputation in the fighting game community through this work for understanding what the genre’s competitive playerbase expected, and the game maintained an active community under their stewardship.

Ports and Co-Development Work

Iron Galaxy has handled ports and co-development work on a wide range of titles. Notable projects include Borderlands: The Handsome Collection for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, the Darksiders Warmastered Edition, Shovel Knight ports, and Divinity: Original Sin ports. The studio also provided co-development support on Overwatch and worked on Batman: Arkham Knight’s troubled PC port alongside Rocksteady and Warner Bros., a high-profile project that launched in a poor technical state and was temporarily pulled from sale. Iron Galaxy maintained the distinction that the PC version’s core problems predated their involvement, though the studio received public scrutiny during the fallout.

Rumbleverse

Rumbleverse was Iron Galaxy’s original battle royale, a free-to-play wrestling-themed brawler released in August 2022 and published by Epic Games. It received positive reviews for its inventive concept but struggled to build a sustainable player base. Epic shut down the servers in February 2023, less than six months after launch, citing an inability to grow the game to a self-sustaining level. The closure was disappointing for a studio that had put significant original development effort into the project.

Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3+4

Following Vicarious Visions’ absorption into Blizzard Albany, Iron Galaxy took over the Tony Hawk remaster project. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 3+4 released in July 2025, continuing the remaster series that Vicarious Visions had begun with Pro Skater 1+2 in 2020. The game brought the same approach of faithful recreation with modern visuals to the third and fourth entries in the series.