The Origin of Trinor

Trinor \ˈtrī-nȯr\ [trai-nor]

A combination of the words “Trident” (tri) and “North” (nor).

Derived from combining “Trident,” symbolizing the three founders, each with unique skills and competencies, forming a unified and powerful entity. “North” represents the company’s Scandinavian roots. 

Chapter 1
It all started back in 2020 when our founder, Philip, was playing a mod with his friends in Minecraft. A direct gaming experience with a game mod that quickly turned into a saturated experience due to the many limitations that such a game mode often has. This feeling sparked a passion in Philip. There was so much potential for this mod to be more than just a few months of gameplay but a real stand-alone gaming experience.

He quickly began, in his spare time, to conduct extensive field research on this game mode and interviewed hundreds of players to understand the general experience of the game mode. It didn’t take long before a clear trend emerged. Players craved depth and renewal of this game mode. And thus began the journey to assemble the perfect founding team, a process that involved many ups and downs and took roughly two years.

Philip met Bjarke in April 2022 through a forum post for game development, and through Bjarke’s network, they found Daniel during a barbecue evening. For about half a year, we worked on the project in our spare time, and at the end of 2022, we made a joint decision to go all-in on pursuing a shared passion and dream. The start of a typical cliché startup journey. Fasten your seatbelt, because it’s going to be one hell of a ride!

Bjarkes living room aka our dungeon throughout 2023.

We started 2023 with some bumps in the road. We had to switch engine after four months and faced rejections from the national support scheme for game startups. It was definitely not the start we had hoped for, but it forced us to change our approach, think more creatively, broadly, and internationally. In hindsight, it helped set us on the right course.

We brought in interns and expanded the team while taking on external bootstrap projects, including developing a small game about coffee production, which was showcased at the National Museum in Qatar. We participated in the national startup competition “Guldæg,” where we were named one of the winners of the “Scope Your Business Program” organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The Trade Council, along with bussiness experts.

We ended a busy year by being recognized at “Games for the Future” as an emerging growth venture in the Danish game industry by the Minister of Culture, and shortly thereafter, we received support from the Danish Innovation Fund as one of the few game startups in Denmark.

Chapter 2
2024 started incredibly strong at Trinor, though it turned out to bring more external challenges than we had expected. Chapter 2 began as we moved into our very own office, what a feeling, and such a huge motivation boost for the entire team!

Throughout 2024, we were in full development mode, moving at high speed. Over the summer, we had 11 people working full-time, all driven by a shared passion for game development and Skyward Masters. Entirely bootstrapped, which is wild to look back on! We’re truly grateful to all the talented and dedicated people who joined us on this journey.

It was still a tough year for the industry, with record layoffs and a dried-up investor appetite for first-time gaming founders  and even for seasoned ones.

But thanks to our agile and lean approach, we managed to stay afloat and bootstrap our way through 2024, finishing the year on a high note.

2025 has been our best year so far, as we finally kicked off external playtesting with our Discord community, currently running bi-weekly sessions. We’re gradually increasing the number of testers, already seeing 90%+ retention and continuously improving feedback.

It has also been a challenging year financially, as our Innofounder grant expired at the start of the year, pushing us back to full bootstrapping. Still, our ability to navigate tough conditions and our determination to make Trinor and Skyward Masters a success have started to shine through after three years of hard, unpaid work.

Just a month ago, we received the best news of our journey, and the past few weeks have been nothing short of incredible. The entire team has been working tirelessly to prepare for this news to go public.

Chapter 3
We’ve reached a new high and a groundbreaking milestone!

The Trinor team is expanding, and we’re thrilled to welcome Frederik Byskov, founder of Astralis, one of the most iconic CS esports teams ever. Frederik also played a key role in BLAST.tv and AceZone, and now the circle comes full with his involvement in a brand-new FPS.

To make things even more exciting, we’re also welcoming Peter “dupreeh” Rasmussen! A true Counter-Strike legend and the only player in the world with 5 Major titles to his name! That’s a flex, and we’re not afraid to brag about it..

Frederik and Peter have joined us as minority investors and partners, helping us bring the vision of Skyward Masters to life.

We hosted our first-ever on-site playtest and invited community members and investors to watch the players’ reactions. It was an overall great success with valuable learnings about the game. This is definitely not the last time we’ll host events like this! We’re already planning a bigger one with a tournament structure and awesome prizes from our supporters, SteelSeries and Red Bull.

You can join future events by becoming part of our Discord community at discord.gg/skywardmasters.

The Origin of Trinor

Trinor \ˈtrī-nȯr\ [trai-nor]

A combination of the words “Trident” (tri) and “North” (nor).

Derived from combining “Trident,” symbolizing the three founders, each with unique skills and competencies, forming a unified and powerful entity. “North” represents the company’s Scandinavian roots. 

Chapter 1
It all started back in 2020 when our founder, Philip, was playing a game mode with his friends in Minecraft. A direct gaming experience with a game mode that quickly turned into a saturated experience due to the many limitations that such a game mode often has. This feeling sparked a passion in Philip. There was so much potential for this mod to be more than just a few months of gameplay but a real stand-alone gaming experience.

He quickly began, in his spare time, to conduct extensive field research on this game mode and interviewed hundreds of players to understand the general experience of the game mode. It didn’t take long before a clear trend emerged. Players craved depth and renewal of this game mode. And thus began the journey to assemble the perfect founding team, a process that involved many ups and downs and took roughly two years.

Philip met Bjarke in April 2022 through a forum post for game development, and through Bjarke’s network, they found Daniel during a barbecue evening. For about half a year, we worked on the project in our spare time, and at the end of 2022, we made a joint decision to go all-in on pursuing a shared passion and dream. The start of a typical cliché startup journey. Fasten your seatbelt, because it’s going to be one hell of a ride!

We started 2023 with some bumps in the road. We had to switch engine after four months and faced rejections from the national support scheme for game startups. It was definitely not the start we had hoped for, but it forced us to change our approach, think more creatively, broadly, and internationally. In hindsight, it helped set us on the right course.

We brought in interns and expanded the team while taking on external bootstrap projects, including developing a small game about coffee production, which was showcased at the National Museum in Qatar. We participated in the national startup competition “Guldæg,” where we were named one of the winners of the “Scope Your Business Program” organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, The Trade Council, along with business experts.

We ended a busy year by being recognized at “Games for the Future” as an emerging growth venture in the Danish game industry by the Minister of Culture, and shortly thereafter, we received support from the Danish Innovation Fund as one of the few game startups in Denmark.

Chapter 2
2024 started incredibly strong at Trinor, though it turned out to bring more external challenges than we had expected. Chapter 2 began as we moved into our very own office, what a feeling, and such a huge motivation boost for the entire team! 

Throughout 2024, we were in full development mode, moving at high speed. Over the summer, we had 11 people working full-time, all driven by a shared passion for game development and Skyward Masters. Entirely bootstrapped, which is wild to look back on! We’re truly grateful to all the talented and dedicated people who joined us on this journey.

It was still a tough year for the industry, with record layoffs and a dried-up investor appetite for first-time gaming founders  and even for seasoned ones.

But thanks to our agile and lean approach, we managed to stay afloat and bootstrap our way through 2024, finishing the year on a high note.

2025 has been our best year so far, as we finally kicked off external playtesting with our Discord community, currently running bi-weekly sessions. We’re gradually increasing the number of testers, already seeing 90%+ retention and continuously improving feedback.

It has also been a challenging year financially, as our Innofounder grant expired at the start of the year, pushing us back to full bootstrapping. Still, our ability to navigate tough conditions and our determination to make Trinor and Skyward Masters a success have started to shine through after three years of hard, unpaid work.

Just a month ago, we received the best news of our journey, and the past few weeks have been nothing short of incredible. The entire team has been working tirelessly to prepare for this news to go public.