A year after the game's release, Buckland decided to work on a follow-up, Crystal Quest, which would take the gameplay of its predecessor, and add new features.
Most notable among the many projects that Buckland worked on as part of VIS was 2001's State of Emergency, which saw him attached to the game midway through development as executive director and design consultant.
As part of this process, Patrick Buckland spun-off Stainless Games as an independent company again, which was financed by Les Edgar, founder of Bullfrog and ex-chairman of VIS.
The company has released a number of titles, including a port of Crystal Quest, Happy Tree Friends: False Alarm, Warlords, Tempest, Battlezone, Asteroids, Missile Command, Centipede & Millipede, Novadrome, RISK: Factions, Carmageddon: Max Damage and most notable Magic: The Gathering – Duels of the Planeswalkers.
In 2013, Buckland was one of a consortium of British individuals who bought the rights back to the sports car manufacturer TVR, from Nikolay Smolensky.