NaturalMotion snaps up $11M, adds SF headquarters

Who says mobile games have to have lower effects quality, NaturalMotion certainly doesn't think so

San Francisco's SOMA district is about to get a lot more gamey with the upcoming addition of 3D gaming company NaturalMotion now that the company has secured $11 million in funding. 

Benchmark is leading this Series B funding round that will help place NaturalMotion in the neighborhood with social and casual gaming companies GREE and Zynga.  

The rapidly-growing mobile social games developer and publisher will use the funds to open its U.S. headquarters in San Francisco as well as scale the company and further invest in its mobile technology.

NaturalMotion made its mobile social gaming debut with a title called My Horse. The game entered a new field: pairing console production values with mobile usage patterns. 

The company plans to create games that can be played in short increments but that provide console quality, 3D graphics. 

As of this announcement, NaturalMotion is also stating that it is in a substantial hiring phase, looking for, what else, engineers and developers. Zynga and GREE better keep their employee lunches in-house with growing competition just down the road. 

NaturalMotion is based in Oxford, England and has experienced 30 million downloads of its games to date. The company published on both iOS and Android, with popular titles like My Horse, Ice Breaker Hockey, Backbreaker Football and Jenga.