Distinct Office Space for a Gaming Start-Up

Striking Distance is a start-up video gaming firm that employs creative engineers, programmers, sales and marketing staff to bring new action video games to market. Striking Distance’s decision to not be in Silicon Valley meant its new East Bay location in San Ramon offered, for the first time, an exciting alternative for would-be talent. Located in the Bishop Ranch development, their space is within a four million square foot campus that offers an easy commute, autonomous shuttle buses, hiking and running trails, and a new, award-winning city center of retail and restaurants.

Striking Distance selected HDR to design their space due to the creativity displayed in our many other successful Bishop Ranch projects, as well as our understanding of the complex program and aggressive move-in schedule. We committed to a design schedule of two months including programming and full interior design services through to construction documents. So quick was the schedule that the firm had not decided on a name, had not yet developed their brand identity, and went from zero to more than sixty-five employees from the start of project to completion of construction.

Our design solution for Striking Distance’s space created a largely open office environment with minimal private offices. A mix of conference, meeting, huddle and call rooms were equally distributed around the space to ensure staff always had a place to meet. A central town hall gathering space provides a break area, informal all-hands meeting space, and a physical connection to the different departments to promote collaboration. The program also included sound-proof editing rooms, a dailies room, motion capture space, and media room for product testing.

The requirement to provide a darker, more subdued environment for the many programmers and engineers is juxtaposed with a vibrant blue and green palette that provides a dynamic punctuation in key areas where staff and visitors congregate. An “exploding” reception area of jagged angles in the design of the walls and ceiling makes for a memorable introduction to the space and hints at the action and movement of the gaming world. This visual movement is continued in the town hall area with a dramatic and undulating ceiling scape.