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Team17 co-founder Martyn Brown died on 28 December 2024. His son, Jack Brown, said he died peacefully in his sleep at 8:17 a.m., surrounded by family, after a prolonged battle with a series of strokes. Team17 confirmed his death; the time and medical circumstances come from his son’s statement, reported by Game Developer.
Who was Martyn Brown?
Brown was a British games developer and publisher best known as one of the three people who founded Team17. The company’s official history dates its founding by Debbie Bestwick, Brown and Michael Robinson to 7 December 1990. Team17 remembers Brown as a founder who also served as a producer, designer, creative director and studio director before leaving the company in 2011.
Team17’s remembrance, published on 28 January 2025, calls him “Spadge,” the nickname colleagues knew him by. It describes a career that connected creative work with the practical work of bringing developers and games together.
How did Brown help build Team17?
Founding the studio and assembling its early teams
Team17’s first game, Full Contact, was released for Commodore Amiga in 1991, according to the company’s history. Its remembrance credits Brown with assembling the teams behind early titles including Full Contact, Alien Breed and Project X. Those credits reflect Team17’s account of his work; the company does not provide an independently audited tally of his personal output.
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Recognizing the potential of Worms
Team17 says Brown met Worms creator Andy Davidson at a trade show in 1994, played the game and offered Davidson a publishing deal. Team17’s history dates the original Worms to 1995. The company reports that it sold over 250,000 copies within six months of release; that is Team17’s company-history figure, not a measure of Brown’s individual contribution or of the franchise’s later sales.
There was a small personal link in the game, too: Team17 says “Spadge” was one of the default worm names in the original 1995 release. The 2024 Worms Armageddon: Anniversary Edition also included museum content honoring Brown, according to the company.
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What was Brown’s contribution beyond Team17?
Brown co-founded Game Republic, a Yorkshire games-industry network, in 2003. Game Republic says he continued supporting the organization and other studios after leaving Team17 in 2011. It presented him with its Games Legend award at a Wakefield event on 21 November 2024, just weeks before his death.
Game Republic Managing Director Jamie Sefton recalled Brown’s welcome to the network as “I hope you’re ready for this!” Sefton’s tribute describes a personal memory, not an independently measured assessment. Together with Team17 colleagues’ recollections of Brown bringing people into teams and projects, it points to a legacy that included community-building as well as game production and publishing.
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How colleagues remember him
Team17’s remembrance mixes memories of creative decisions and career support with lighter stories about pub trips, Leeds United and the dice game Perudo. Kevin Carthew, who was Team17’s Head of Design from 1998 to 2023, recalled Brown’s reaction to a game review: “It’s dead good this innit?”
Team17’s tribute says Brown “will be missed by all who knew him” and recognizes his contribution to the company’s history, the games he helped produce and the people he made smile. Such tributes are colleagues’ and community peers’ testimony; they offer a human picture of Brown, rather than a neutral measurement of his influence.
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