GamesIndustry.biz in a recent interview. Phillips and Silver Rain CEO and founder Abubaker Salim are speaking with us to promote the news that the upstart studio has signed a deal with Electronic Arts to have its first game featured in the EA Originals program. Phillips' answer about gut instinct is in regards to choosing EA as a partner over the multitude of other funding and publishing options available to independent studios, but similar sentiments were expressed by both Phillips and Salim for a number of questions, including their original decision to partner up on Silver Rain. "Mel was on the same wavelength in seeing the potential of power that the games industry has in regards to telling stories and moving people," Salim says. "It just felt natural."