Fallout From the Activision and Vivendi Merger 51
SlappingOysters writes "Despite being announced last year, the merger of Activision and Vivendi into the company Activision-Blizzard only became official recently. Gameplayer investigates how the merger has affected upcoming games and development studios between the companies. As part of that investigation, they received official word that only three Vivendi games made the cut, and in this article they detail which titles have been dropped, which studios have been dropped, and who is likely to snap them up and add them to their portfolio. A lot of big names have been affected."
Yes... (Score:5, Insightful)
This was expected. It's a common concept in resource application. It applies in all sorts of things, ranging from development to things like battle and war. It's called "focus fire" by some.
They are simply focusing their resources on the most important (they think) projects in order to release the best possible ones they can and maximize their business potential.
Fallout? Is that the right word? I guess... Unless you see it like I do: We're going to get a few really good products instead of a bunch of just ok products. I'll take the former every time.
Re:Yes... (Score:4, Funny)
Fallout is a REALLY bad word to use in a news headline (especially one with the text hidden on main /. page) for people waiting for release of Fallout3...
Re: (Score:1)
I'm not waiting. I fully expect Bethesda to let everyone down. I might be surprised, but after the shiny borefest of Oblivion I'm not holding out hope.
Re: (Score:2)
Just out of curiosity, if you considered Oblivion "bad" what do you consider to be a "good" RPG released in the last 3 years and what makes it better than Oblivion?
Re: (Score:2)
Why limit it to the last 3 years? Simply saying that makes it obvious that you're aware the gameplay sucked and it was nothing more than shiny mediocrity.
Re: (Score:2)
To evaluate your sincerity. Oblivion was widely-praised by most everyone, with the notable exception of some Japanese style console RPG fans, in particular those who favored old SNES rpgs like Final Fantasy VI. Much the same was true of Morrowind. You also attacked the graphics as "shiny", implying to me that you haven't favored many modern RPGs. By not mentioning a modern RPG you're confirming my suspicion that you're mainly influenced by nostalgia, not valid critique.
Personally, I think the 'open world' a
Re: (Score:2)
you make a lot of assumptions. None of them remotely right. Oblivion wasn't that widely praised among many of the forums, including their own. Reviewers are fairly meaningless as that Kane and Lynch bit with gamespot showed us. However people constantly derided its gameplay choices (auto-leveling of enemies being the chief one). I called the graphics shiny because they took the time to focus on graphics rather than good gameplay. It is called a video GAME remember? Not a movie or TV show. An open world isn'
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
You must be talking about the Crash Bandicoot series of video games that sell very well...
I guess a lot of people might debate the 'really good' status of a game that hasn't been released yet... But I think there's a word for those kind of people ;p
Re: (Score:1)
Do they really still sell? The series seems more like an also-ran these days, a desperate grasp for its glory days that ended along with the PSX era. Same goes for the Spyro games. Another mascot platformer in the long list of has-beens. Weren't these series done by a different team back in the day anyway?
Re: (Score:1)
Yes, but will this have any affect on the release of Wrath of the Lich King? Inquiring minds want to know!
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I seriously doubt the November release is in danger. I'm wondering more about Diablo 3's release.
Re: (Score:1)
Hmmm. After reading the Diablo III FAQ I see that they will support systems I want to play games on (Mac OSX has a bit too many proprietary things for me to be totally comfortable with it, but hey, it's still Unix inside). I guess I will buy a copy on general principles. Thanks for the tip.
Re:Yes... (Score:5, Insightful)
Fallout is the right word, because what we're going to get is a few cash cows instead of a bunch of products of varying quality, including niche masterpeices.
Now I can see why A-B want to have few titles which sell in big numbers, but if every company did exactly the same thing our industry would collapse overnight under the weight of it's own mediocrity.
Re: (Score:2)
"but if every company did exactly the same thing our industry would collapse overnight under the weight of it's own mediocrity."
the sad reality is that it already has at least twice.
the NES brought them out the last hole... who will bring them out the next?
Atari was one of the biggest culprits the last time where are they now?
Re: (Score:2)
I was really looking forward to that game, not so much for quality, but just for a bit of fun in a ridiculous mashup of heavy metal and fighting.
Re: (Score:2)
Red Baron
Is ANY company better after a merger? (Score:4, Interesting)
Serious question: can you name any company that was better after a merger? I can't think of a single example! (And when I say "better" I mean better from the customer's or employee's point of view not just a short-term-stockholder's view.)
Companies don't merge to benefit customers. (Score:4, Interesting)
Or employees. Customers are just people they sell their products to; employees are people they hire when they need labor. The definition of "better" doesn't include them. Better, in business terms, means more valuable and more profitable.
Electronic Arts was definitely better after it bought Tiburon. Tiburon was a truly excellent development studio, working closely with EA, and it was in both their interests for EA to buy them.
Re: (Score:1)
With the exception that EA has ruined what was a great game in Madden... Although its better after the second update Madden 2009 should not have been released.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:1)
Basically the game will freeze at random points when playing. This requires you to hard reboot the PS3, which from reports has bricked a number of peoples PS3's. It appears to happen far more frequently when playing in franchise mode. Basically you can play one game then you need to reboot your PS3 or the game will crash. Aside from this there are major issues with the statistic tracking for players and graphic glitches galore.
I downloaded the second patch for the game which seems to have addressed all thes
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
In my opinion, AT&T Wireless got a lot better when Cingular bought them.
Re: (Score:2)
That wasn't a merger. That was AT&T selling off a division. Which was bound be better off under its new owners, since pre-SBC AT&T had the worst management in the history of capitalism.
Re: (Score:1)
Square-Enix, maybe?
Re: (Score:2)
.
Pixar.
Independent studios have always found it a struggle to survive.
Pixar hasn't had a commercial failure. But you can burn through $200 million dollars in production costs alone for a feature like WALL-E.
That can bring you down very fast if you have a string of failures - and not much in the way of alternative revenue streams.
Re: (Score:2)
SCO ! (Score:2)
Oh, bother, they didn't merge but they still got the same result ...
Fallout (Score:2, Redundant)
I thought Fallout 3 was coming from Bethesda, not Activision-Vivendi. ;)
Re: (Score:2)
Actually Fallout (not Fallout 3) is from Black Isle.
Got me worried... (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
you'll get all the asteroid clones you ever wanted...
I'm going to guess you're referring to what happened the last time... did anyone EVER buy E.T?
Re: (Score:1)
I fondly remember playing E.T. in my youth. And not understanding a damn second of it, either!
Merger (Score:2)
Sierra (Score:3, Interesting)
As someone who basically grew up on Sierra adventure games (King's Quest was ythe first adventure game I ever played, on the IBM PC Jr, with IR Keyboard!) I have to wonder what in the world their problem is.
King's Quest? Space Quest? The adventure games haven't gotten a lot of play the last ten years, but now that we see Sam & Max coming back, and episodic content online, how hard would it be to create a 3rd person Quest for Glory action/adventure RPG? Count me as first in line to get that one!
Phantasmagoria? Gabriel Knight? Those two *at least* could be crafted into horror/action games. Not that they should.
I really hope these games dont' get buried under legal BS as so many important titles have in the past. There's a lot of marketing potential there, and if it's done the right way it could make whoever has the rights a nice little pile of cash, and maybe a new following.
Re:Sierra (Score:4, Informative)
As someone who basically grew up on Sierra adventure games
As did I - Sierra games were among my first PC gaming experiences.
I have to wonder what in the world their problem is.
Well, from someone in the gaming industry, I can tell you what happened from my perspective. It's the same reason many companies go to hell - horrible management. For the past decade or so (a few years after Sierra was sold to CUC International), it's been pretty well known in the industry to stay far, far away from Sierra. I had heard many stories from a fellow programmer who had escaped - he had worked there for a number of years before being let go in one of their many "reorganizations".
Essentially, they were borderline abusive to their employees... long hours, low pay, little respect, and constant lies. People were developing chronic health problems from the stress, etc... If anyone complained too much, they were simply replaced by new developers fresh out of college - who would tend to put up with much worse than seasoned developers. Basically, it epitomized the worst of the game development industry from a few years ago (it's not like that so much anymore).
The result was obvious and predictable. Sierra's ability to create and release a decent product dwindled along with it's company morale, and the best and brightest employees were slowly bled off. Eventually, internal product development was canceled, and they became a publisher only. However, bad management screws up all things over time, and this was no exception. Sierra eventually reorganized pretty much out of existence, and the doors of their Bellevue, Washington offices closed in 2004. At this point, they're essentially just a division in name only of whoever owns them.
I really hope these games don't get buried under legal BS as so many important titles have in the past. There's a lot of marketing potential there, and if it's done the right way it could make whoever has the rights a nice little pile of cash, and maybe a new following.
I'd love to see this happen. My bet is that Activision will be too greedy to sell the rights at a price anyone could afford, but too indecisive to make any use of them, and they'll lie unused in perpetuity. It's what happens with a lot of great properties.
I suppose I could be wrong, but I'm really not holding my breath.
Vibrant in-text ads (Score:3, Interesting)
Yet another website that uses in-frame popups when you just mouse over a word, and refuses to disable them.
This kind of annoyvertising reminds me of X10.com's popups, and shouldn't be tolerated.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Perhaps... (Score:1)
Perhaps they'll lower the price on the old Sierra titles to a company sized more like the one that did the Penny Arcade title. That game rocked and was totally worth the $19 I spent on it. If they used that format and had an update to the Gold Rush! title I'd buy it in a heartbeat (I'm a history major, so I have odd tastes).
Episodic content in that manner is really interesting. The art style was familiar from two known artists. And the 'steampunk' styling was fresh and original for what was essentially a sp
Re: (Score:2)
This surprises me, considering how heavily they were promoting the game at San Diego Comic-Con this past July.
No mention of Radical (Score:2)
Radical entertainment is a studio owned by Universal / Vivendi that passed to Blizzard. They are still in business, but they laid off about 100 people in Vancouver.
I know this because it has made my own job hunting a pain in the ass.
END COMMUNICATION
English Majors, Stand Back! (Score:1)
I know this is just, y'know, the Internet, but for Christ's sake, doesn't anyone proofread any more?
Please, Jebus, make it stop! (Score:2)