Heart Machine


Heart Machine is an independent video game development studio founded by Alex Preston. The studio was founded by Preston in 2013 to support development of Hyper Light Drifter, a game that he was leading the development on during a crowdfunding campaign. The name Heart Machine draws from various medical conditions related to congenital heart disease that Preston had suffered and which were also inspirations for Hyper Light Drifter.
With Hyper Light Drifter far exceeding its crowdfunding goals, Preston established Heart Machine in Glitch Space, an open co-operative office area he had helped previously establish in Culver City, California for other independent developers. Hyper Light Drifter was released in 2016 to generally positive reviews and received several gaming award nominations.
The studio announced its next title, Solar Ash, in March 2019, to be published on Windows by Annapurna Interactive. According to Preston, the studio had been working on Solar Ash for some time after finishing up release on Hyper Light Drifter, and the new game includes "a whole new set of incredible tech and key innovations". It is said to be set in the same universe as Hyper Light Drifter but is not a direct sequel to that game. Alex Preston is once again acting as the main designer, with Zoë Quinn writing for the narrative. Rich Vreeland is slated to return to compose music for it. For the new game, Heart Machine have decided to abandon the 2D pixel art style and instead opt for a more open 3D world with a third-person camera view of the player character, although they have tried to retain the original game's world aestethics and translated it to the new style. Preston have said that console releases are in the works as well.. An introduction trailer has been revealed in June 2020 at PS5 digital showcase with the game set to be released in 2021.