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Businesses Entertainment Games

Ion Storm Austin Closes 48

Posted by Zonk from the end-of-something dept.
It's dragged on for quite a while, but GamesIndustry.biz has the word that the Ion Storm offices in Austin have closed. Originally founded by John Romero, Tom Hall, and Todd Porter, Ion Storm Austin has been responsible for the release of Deus Ex, Thief: Deadly Shadows, and Daikatana. From the article: "This is part of [Eidos's] move to consolidate and strengthen its technical and management capabilities into a smaller number of studios which are capable of scaling up in order to meet the competitive challenges that lie ahead, particularly in anticipation of next-generation technologies and platforms"
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Ion Storm Austin Closes More

Ion Storm Austin Closes

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  • Way to go, EA. Close the one dev house that turned out DECENT GAMES!! (Excluding Daikatana, of course. What the hell happened there?)

    • Re:ARGH (Score:4, Interesting)

      by NonSequor ( 230139 ) on Friday February 11, 2005 @10:56AM (#11642188) Journal
      Well the official reason is that they have decided they would rather increase the size of their San Francisco studio by adding another development team there instead of continuing carrying the cost of an extra studio. This makes fincancial sense since from what little I know, the main benefit of a game company having studios in different locations is for the purpose of recruiting developers from different regions (e.g. Ubisoft opened a Montreal studio to recruit North American developers) and right now people are far more willing to move for a new job.

      However, they are firing 35 people in Austin and hiring 50 in San Francisco. I didn't see anything about them moving anyone from Austin to San Francisco so they must not be satisfied with the team in Austin.

      Also, the team in Austin wasn't responsible for Daikatana. That was spawned from John Romero's hedonistic Dallas studio. That closed down long ago. Pretty much everything good that Ion Storm produced came from the Austin studio.
    • But they didn't own Ion Storm.
  • No matter how many decent games they turned out since, the gaming gods would never redeem their souls for the shitmess that was ....Daikatana.

    • Re:The Karma of Daikatana (Score:3, Interesting)

      by grub ( 11606 )

      I never went far in Daikatana but liked Deus Ex a lot. I love the Thief series but was quite disappointed when Thief: Deadly Shadows PC version turned out to be just a port of the console version. Levels in Thief and Thief 2 were huge (ie: the Life of the Party level in T2) but in T:DS one had to go from zone to zone. The city was more like a small town rather than the intimidating place it was in the two first games.
      • That's what happen when you do primary development of a game for consoles. The same thing happened to Deus Ex 2. It was but a pale shadow of its predecessor, largely for the same reasons: large, open levels broken into smaller 'zones', overly simplified gameplay, etc.

        I hate that this is happening, but it seems to be an ongoing trend. I wish developers would just keep console franchises on consoles, and PC franchises on PCs. Either that, or develop them as PC games, then port them to consoles. It's a l

    • the gaming gods would never redeem their souls for the shitmess that was ....Daikatana.

      1) these people did not release Daikatana. Instead, they did winners line Deus Ex, Thief and Anachronox. (Deus Ex 2 was not nearly as good as Deus Ex 1, but it was still ok.)

      2) And even Daikatana wasn't as bad as people make it sound. I suspect that most of the people who preach the `Daikatana sucks!' mantra on /. have never even played it.

      Granted, it was pretty mediocre. Had it come out several years earl

  • Ion Storm Austin was not responsibile for Daikatana. That was Ion Storm Dallas.

  • Daikatana? I don't think so... (Score:3, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 11, 2005 @11:20AM (#11642641)
    Daikatana was made by Ion Storm Dallas, Jon Romero's studio.

    Ion Storm Austin was founded using some of Romero's money, but the core of the team was all the old Looking Glass guys that worked on the original Thief and System Shock titles. Looking Glass had gone bankrupt a few months earlier, for reasons I still don't totally understand.

    There are lots of funny stories about ISA's start-up, Warren Specter had to explain to people all the time that "no no no, that's Ion Storm DALLAS, we're Ion Storm AUSTIN, we have nothing to do with Daikatana," etc etc.

    • Re:Daikatana? I don't think so... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Darth ( 29071 ) on Friday February 11, 2005 @12:13PM (#11643368) Homepage
      Ion Storm Austin was started as an independent studio and became a part of Ion Storm when Romero talked Spector into it during their search for initial funding.

      This happened before Looking Glass closed. When Looking Glass closed, Ion Storm Austin acquired the rights to Thief and hired some of the Looking Glass guys.

      My memory is a bit fuzzy on the timing exactly, but i think Deus Ex had been released by the time Looking Glass closed.
      • I think you're right... Looking Glass didn't quite go bankrupt, but their games weren't huge sellers and Ion Storm Dallas was burning through Eidos's cash like there was no tomorrow, so Eidos bet the farm on Daikatana.

        Looking Glass were twisting in the wind for a while before closing, as well... couldn't get approval for a new game, weren't sure how long they would be funded for, etc.
  • So who owns the rights to the Deus Ex franchise? Even though DX:IW was somewhat of a disaster, the idea behind the game's still great. Open ended game play, great storylines etc.

    I wonder if Deus Ex 3 could be picked up by some other development company. It'd be nice to see a third installment.
  • This is part of [Eidos's] move to consolidate and strengthen its technical and management capabilities into a smaller number of studios which are capable of scaling up in order to meet the competitive challenges that lie ahead, particularly in anticipation of next-generation technologies and platforms

    This sharply reminds me of Michael T. Suit (suit without a man inside) from Dilbert ...

    MT: Hi, my name is Michael T. Suit. All my friends call me MT.

    Dilbert: ...

    MT: I enhance core competencies by
  • "This is part of [Eidos's] move to consolidate and strengthen its technical and management capabilities into a smaller number of studios which are capable of scaling up in order to meet the competitive challenges that lie ahead, particularly in anticipation of next-generation technologies and platforms"

    I just love marketing buzzwords. You gotta have some talent to say "we axed the studio 'cause it was a money drain" in such a way!

    Anyway, farewell Ion Storm. Daikatana sucked (sorry John, it did), bu
  • SHUT IT DOWN!

    --riney

  • Oh great... (Score:2, Insightful)

    by HogynCymraeg ( 624823 )
    First looking glass studios fold and sell the fantastic thief franchise to Ion Storm, now they've kicked the bucket. What's going to happen to the great Thief series? Gutted...
  • Really, with Ion closed, Amy Hennig of Crystal Dynamics gone, and Warren Spector "missing in action", the future of both "Legacy Of Kain" and "Thief" franchises is uncertain. I don't know what's happenning inside Eidos, but from around two years they've been making wrong moves, one after another... They've earned the title of the worst MIB in the whole industry.
  • A few months ago Ion Storm said that the release of a map editor for Thief III was forthcoming. This is vital to a large number of people; Thief I and II have had dozens of individual fan made levels that are actually higher quality than most commercial games - as well as several campaigns.

    An editor for Thief III would drastically lengthen the games' shelf life, but with the studio closed, I suppose the chances are slim...

    It's unfortunate - the latest expansion for Thief II (T2X - Shadows of the Metal A [thief2x.com]

  • *Wipes a single tear away, then goes on one final Anna Navarre killing spree.*

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