By Allan Bowden-Smith
I don’t normally like to make posts like this in any situation, be it a forum, journal, or indeed my blog, since it feels like I’m just regurgitating information. After all, these studios have all been in the gaming press recently. But still, this deserves a mention.
There was no way that these companies could have survived in their late state during the recession, so it was almost inevitable that they would be shut down. So let us spare a brief moment, and remember those that brought us our hobby.
- Ensemble Studios – Famous for the Age of Empires series of games, and also created the spin-off series Age of Mythos. They were originally independent, before being bought by Microsoft. While they haven’t been totally laid off at the time of writing this, the studio will be shut down entirely at the release of Halo Wars. Microsoft have made this decision, and the head of Ensemble will be starting a new company, with a good chunk of the original staff having been offered a place.
- Black Box – Owned by EA, and known as EA Black Box after EA purchased them under EA Canada. They became an independent studio in 2005, and published many of EA’s large titles including Need For Speed, FIFA, and the NBA Live games. Their most recent accomplishment is Skate 2, the sequel to the revolutionary Tony Hawks rival (that they also developed), Skate. They were let off after completing the title, further enhancing my personal opinion of EA.
- Factor 5 – I will always know Factor 5 as the developers of Rogue Squadron and it’s sequels, but they have been busy bodies through the late 80s and 90s, making the classic R-Type, all the way up to the critically-panned Lair. It’s a disappointment to see this studio bite the dust, however what is more disappointing is that the remake of Kid Icarus dies with them, unless it gets passed on to another team.
- Free Radical – The team that brought us TimeSplitters, and was planning on bringing us Star Wars: Battlefront III. Having only recently discovered the original TimeSplitters and Second Sight, I do not really know how big a blow Free Radical’s closure is, since all I heard was ‘the developers of Haze’, the game that was no doubt responsible for the initial stages of their demise.
- Flagship Studios – The developers of Hellgate: London. The multiplayer component has become somewhat famous for being a failure, but despite how Namco Bandai have said they will drop it, HanbitSoft have said that they will continue the multiplayer component for free, since they own the Hellgate IP. Flagship was originally formed from Blizzard, during the mass resignation of employees due to Vivendi’s (Blizzard’s parent company) scrutiny during development of Diablo III.
They aren’t the first, and will not be the last.
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