Joshua Howard named Bella Sara Online VP

Hidden City Games has named Microsoft veteran Joshua Howard senior VP of Bella Sara Online, a horse-themed online world for girls which boasts over 1.6 million registered users.

Howard has 15 years of experience at Microsoft where he was most recently group manager for Carbonated Games, the casual games studio he started at the company. Prior to that, he was lead program manager for MSN Games/Zone.com.

"Joshua Howard, with his experience running a casual games studio and perspective as a father of two girls, is a clear choice to lead the evolution of BellaSara.com," said Hidden City Games CEO Peter Adkison.

"BellaSara.com captures the magic of the brand in a safe and engaging experience, and Howard will expand it into a robust online destination rich in features and fun."

Adkison helped launch the Pokîmon and Magic: The Gathering trading card phenomena and founded Wizards of the Coast, which he sold to Hasbro in 1999 for nearly USD 500 million.

Bella Sara, a set of horse-themed trading cards, was developed by Danish social worker Gitte Odder Brændgaard. Each card is now imprinted with a code that unlocks a virtual version of that horse on the web site.