Fall of the Independents
Posted on Jan 21, 2011 in History
As time rolls on, we often see smaller, independent game studios bought up by larger companies. I'm sure many people have seen some of their favourite studios crushed by the hand of the publisher giants. But there's also the other side of the fence - independent developers who have been purchased by big-name companies, but retain creative control over their games.
The Fallen
There are many examples of studios which have been consumed by far larger entities and subsequently been destroyed, but I have a selected a few examples to talk about. I tend to rant a bit about this kind of stuff, so I've edited out a bunch of unimportant details.
Westwood
Westwood Studios were the original creators of the Command & Conquer series. In 1998, they were bought out by EA, and up until 2003, they released several good games under the Westwood name (ignoring the terrible FPS spin-off Renegade).
Westwood were officially shut down in 2003, and whatever remained of the studio was merged with EA Los Angeles. Many employees resigned and moved on to different studios. The following games in the Command & Conquer series were increasingly disappointing - the last one being Tiberian Twilight, which I consider to be the final nail in the coffin for the series.
Infinity Ward
Infinity Ward created the first Call of Duty, and were snatched up by Activision the day after it was released. They continued the series with Call of Duty 2 and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, which were both better than their predecessors. The first signs of Activision screwing around with Infinity Ward was when development of Call of Duty 3 was passed over to Treyarch - another studio owned by Activision. Whether you like Treyarch or not, this removed a lot of creative input the team had over the series.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was a commercial success, but it created one of the biggest dramas in the gaming industry. The founders of Infinity Ward are still in "legal warfare" with Activision over several million dollars of unpaid royalties. They have since formed an independent studio called Respawn Entertainment. Let's hope they stay independent this time.
Success Stories
Not all studios fail when bought out by larger entities. Let's look at a few that were able to survive.
Irrational
As an independent studio, Irrational Games were best known for their work on System Shock 2 and SWAT 4. They were purchased by Take-Two Interactive in 2006, while they were working on Bioshock. They were renamed to "2K Boston" in 2007, and it seemed as though Irrational were going to disappear.
Despite this, they retained artistic control over Bioshock, which was released to critical acclaim in 2007. Bioshock 2 was allocated to a different studio, but this studio (2K Marin) contained several Irrational developers, and they worked closely with Irrational's Australian studio (2K Australia).
A surprising announcement was made in 2010 - 2K Boston were being renamed back to 'Irrational Games'. They are currently working on Bioshock Infinite, where Irrational's creative director, Ken Levine, still has artistic control with little manipulation from Take-Two.
id
There aren't many people around who haven't heard of id Software. Lead by programming genius John Carmack, they are known for big-name game series' such as Commander Keen, Wolfenstein, Doom and Quake.
In 2009, id was purchased by ZeniMax Media (who also own Bethesda Softworks). An announcement soon followed stating that the deal would in no way affect their latest game, Rage, which looks to be a refreshing change from id's other recently released games (which are, in descending date order: Doom 3, Quake 3, Quake 2, Quake, Doom 2, and Doom.)
Finished Already?
You might have figured out by now that I don't like big-name publishers very much. The game industry as a whole isn't in a very good place right now, and publishers only make it worse. I know they only want to make money, but that doesn't mean I'm not allowed to criticise them for doing it too well. Publishers currently provide most studios with their funding, and therefore are able to swoop in and make all kinds of unwanted changes.
I'm not finished yet. Next week, I'll finish up my rant with examples of independent developers who have created a rock-solid foundation to ensure their survival for a long time to come.
Posted on Jan 21, 2011 in History
Follow-Up Blogs
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