Sandstorm Productions, a new game company formed in April, will work with partner studios, providing funding and handling printing, distribution, and marketing for the studios’ games.  Sandstorm will produce no games on its own.  The first releases from the new company will ship in August.    

David Stansel-Garner, who recently left Catalyst Game Labs as a result of the turmoil at the company (see “Catalyst Pulls Some Shadowrun Products”), is General Manager of Sandstorm.

Sandstorm will initially sell games from two studios:  Closet Nerd, which produces games for the core hobby; and Glowfly, which will produce educational and children’s games.  Both companies have common ownership with Sandstorm. 

Funding was provided by three companies:  Sand Enterprises (Edward Sand), Dinges Enterprises (Joshua Dinges), and Neth LLC (Marvin Neth).  The companies are "venture and angel firms in multiple businessses," according to Stansel-Garner, who said the investors approached him to run the business.

“Sandstorm was created to be the support behind our partner studios,” Stansel-Garner told us.  “The goal here is to allow the studios to focus on making the best products possible…. Our focus is really providing the support and funding.”