EA Shuts Down Pandemic Studios, Cuts 200 Jobs 161
lbalbalba writes "Electronic Arts is shutting down its Westwood-based game developer Pandemic Studios just two years after acquiring it, putting nearly 200 people out of work. 'The struggling video game publisher informed employees Tuesday morning that it was closing the studio as part of a recently announced plan to eliminate 1,500 jobs, or 16% of its global workforce. Pandemic has about 220 employees, but an EA spokesman said that a core team, estimated by two people close to the studio to be about 25, will be integrated into the publisher's other Los Angeles studio, in Playa Vista.' An ex-developer for Pandemic attributed the studio's struggles to poor decisions from the management."
Hmmmm. (Score:2)
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I can't imagine there's a ton of VC floating around right now, and even less so for folks coming out of an unsuccessful (as of late) studio.
Not to say that has anything to do with the developers, mind you.
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There is VC to be had, but not for video game developers. Most of it is going to web startups, places with lower cost to fund (2-5 guys salary, rather than 25+) and the potential to make a massive return (valuations in the 10s or 100s or millions of dollars). Indie gaming just isn't as safe of an investment or have the potential of such high returns.
EA (Score:5, Insightful)
EA destroys and corrupts whatever it touches. A developer being bought by EA is the kiss of death for all their franchises, IMO. The classic example is Westwood Studios and a series that was very dear to me, Command & Conquer.
At least we'll always have new versions of Madden!
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EA destroys and corrupts whatever it touches. A developer being bought by EA is the kiss of death
But I thought that they bring out the whips and chains first??
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I agree. The C&C series are what made me love RTS type games. C&C, Red Alert etc and the classics of a game studio who just do it right. Sadly, that was killed by EA and nobody has really stepped up to fill the gap :(
Re:EA (Score:5, Interesting)
In particular co-op RTSs seem to be non-existent and most that do support it seem like it was added at the last moment on a whim. If you're interested in a game that has more focus on the S part of RTS, and excellent co-op opportunities, i recommend AI War: Fleet Command [arcengames.com]. It's an indy game written by a developer who actually cares about it's playerbase(No i'm not that developer, but I do play the game), and makes free DLC available almost every week with bug fixes, gameplay improvements, new units, etc. The gameplay is very asymmetrical. The enemy has already taken over the galaxy and is now distracted with other pursuits. The more planets you capture and the more structures you destroy the more annoyed the enemy becomes, sending larger and more powerful fleets against you. You can't go recklessly taking over every planet you encounter because the enemy would soon be mighty pissed and send everything it has against you.
It's not for everyone, however you should at least check it out if you're finding the RTS platform has been lacking as of late.
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The dev of that game lurks around /. too.
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Re:EA (Score:4, Insightful)
One word:
BULLFROG.
Re:EA (Score:5, Insightful)
I wonder what will happen to their next game, The Saboteur, which is due out in 3 weeks. It is worth noting that they have no other projects announced recently, perhaps this was long on the horizon.
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For the most part the game is done. Any necessary patches, etc. are being handled by the 25.
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Besides, the TFA (second link) clearly points the finger at Pandemic's internal management, rather than EA.
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I do. I'm hoping they could "reform" and be out from EA's thumb. Great company, and being bought up by EA was the worst thing that could happen.
Unfortunately if this happens, they loose much of the IP I would really consider to be theirs in the first place.
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Except that the Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights IP is tied to the D&D license - from Hasbro.
Knights of the Old Republic? LucasArts and Hasbro.
They'd lose Dragon Age, Mass Effect and Jade Empire - and bunch of technology, naturally.
Re:EA (Score:4, Interesting)
What's interesting is that Bioware merged with Pandemic before being bought by EA. Seemed odd that an RPG developer would get together with an FPS developer like that. Also seems strange that if Pandemic was so poorly managed as indicated in other comments that an amazingly well-run company like Bioware would merge with it. Another oddity here is that Riticello, the current CEO of EA, was one of the people who orchestrated with Bioware/Pandemic merger before EA acquired them and he became CEO.
Given all these facts the closure of Pandemic could be a deep betrayal or someone getting their freedom after a big payout. Ah, the world of game business.
At any rate, I keep reminding people that Bioware is now owned by EA. Other studios manage to put out a few good games before they're killed off by EA, too. So, keep hoping the streak lasts.
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I have long boycotted EA - anything they make I won't buy, period. They mistreat their workforce, they use business practices that are borderline illegal to illegal (not paying aged football players for their rights and going around them), to just plain evil - like buying the exclusive rights to just about every kind of american football, and to the ESPN name just so they wouldn't have to compete with Visual Concepts/TakeTwo on Madden, after a sound trouncing from NFL2K5, then having the gall to have a sha
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Yup...I miss the old Westwood so much. Command & Conquer was such a great series before EA got their hands on it. I was actually recently playing over the original again after downloading it from an abandonware site*, and it's still far better than most of the recent ones. Generals isn't bad, though the whole 'generals abilities' thing and unlimited cashflow buildings take a lot out of the game. But C&C3 and RA3 are both complete garbage. Such a huge loss...
I still remember playing on...what the hel
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I keep hearing "RA3 and TW are so horrible!" but nobody ever states a good reason. Is it because they're so polished? Having "big name" actors in the cutscenes? What is it?
I've been playing C&C games since Tiberian Sun, and I like Tiberium Wars and Red Alert 3 better than the previous games. Plus, come on, Tim Curry! TIM CURRY!
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The balance for one. They're too easy. I beat TW in under a week. Yet I've played the original countless times and I still don't think I've ever actually beaten it without taking advantage of game bugs ('sandbag trick' anyone?). It's actually a _challenge_. TW and RA3 are just a grind. Sure, the missions had a bit more depth to them - a few more objectives and larger enemy bases, but in the end it all boiled down to building a shitload of one unit and storming the enemy with it. What fun is that? That shit
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Interestingly one of my pet peeves with the original C&C as well as most RTS games is that they are way too easy for about 80% of the game and painfully hard for the remaining 20%, nothing like getting stuck halfway through a game because you just can't get past some ridiculously hard level (bonus points if it's one of those C&C trademark "fuck this strategy shit, let's just give the player two engineers and a commando" levels that are basically squad tactics and involve no large-scale strategy what
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That's a bit trite. Given the vast tech tree and weapon-vs-target modifiers in Warzone 2100, "most powerful" is largely subjective. What's more "powerful", super-heavy tracked bodies with heavy cannons, packs of light-bodied VTOLS with tank-killer missiles, or swarms of cyborgs with lasers? And how about the decision whether to build mobile units, or to go hog wild on building long ranged fixed artillery and the
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and even better even the players of the PC version freely admit that the PSone port (simultaenous release on both platforms believe it or not) is the exact same game, running at lower resolution. It's 3D so it runs better on the PSone than the C&C ports do and you can have your units behave intelligently, like returning for repair when they get heavily damaged. It also supports the PSone mouse with UI changes if you plug it in. The briefing lady's voice is VERY familiar to SOCOM players.
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If you liked TA, give Supreme Commander a try... some really innovative game play mechanics were introduced.
(SupCom was created by the same guy(s) that created TA)
SupCom 2 is supposedly coming out soon, and as a bonus will be able to run on a 360. (meaning that a dual core should easily be able to churn out a good 2000+ unit battle)
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What I meant was that most games that are called Realtime Strategy are actually Realtime Tactics.
/Mikae
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I've been playing C&C games since Tiberian Sun, and I like Tiberium Wars and Red Alert 3 better than the previous games.
You're not going back far enough.
As someone who has played C&C since the original, Tiberian Sun was the worst of the first four games (C&C 1 and 2, RA 1 and 2), so it's not surprising that you might think the new games are better. But you'd be wrong... the other three games are terrific. The feel of C&C1 and RA1 have never been surpassed. I still play RA2, which is also great fun.
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Okay, I confess I 3 all three of the Red Alert series.
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Less than three, that is.
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Westwood and Origin both hung themselves with the rope that EA gave them. Pandemic did the same, as the second link in this story makes clear. All this shows is that when you give people a bigger budget, the problems don't go away, they get bigger too. It has nothing to do with EA buying the studio; having EA around to bankroll the studio just makes the death spiral that much more spectacular.
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Yep. In recent times also Mercenairies 2 was one of the best coop games I've ever played, if not the best, the free world with so many vehicles and toys to play with just opened so many doors to play around- just doing fun stuff like sticking the cruise missile target beacon onto the side of your friends helicopter and watch him fly around with a cruise missile chasing him was pretty funny. Attacking the enemy base by stealing a large enemy helicopter then slowly dismantling their base by airlifting all the
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I think the worst example is Origin, instantly after EA bought Origin things went down the gutters, I will never forgive EA for killing Ultima the game series which is the grandfather of all western rpgs.
Without Ultima 7 there neither would be any Gothic or anything from Bethestha.
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Westwood ...
Mythic
Bullfrog
Origin
anymore?
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Maxis to some degree...
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so true....
I was almost thinking Sims 3 might bring them back into quality...
Then I found out about them releasing a half finished empty game that micro transactioned you into the ground...
First sims game I actually bought - and it will be the last.
Spore was a great idea - that EA management managed to butcher because their 'user groups' felt were too intelligent for the masses.
Simcity Societies ... what? !
I realised then, whatever was left of maxis was gone.
I dont really think the problem is that hard to f
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Problem is as long as millions buy the same sports game year after year EA wont be gone for good...
People have voted with their wallet and that is they shove EA for the same game over and over again millions into their throat every year.
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Another good example is Bullfrog. After being “aquired”, every single one quit its job, and they founded a new company. Then when that company got bought by EA too, again 60% quit on the spot.
That says something about how much EA is ‘loved’.
I know two ex-EA developers. They both are basically alcoholics now, because of it.
If you are there, you are basically a slave code monkey. Their whole process of game development is from its innermost core designed to kill off all creative life.
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If the people selling it had given a damn they'd have had a poison pill provision to protect their people. Since EA is a known evil the sellouts are wholly to blame.
The 25 employees who remain ... (Score:3, Informative)
Obligitory (Score:2)
So EA wanted to drop the hammer on a pandemic (Score:1)
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Unfortunately, it seemed like they may have actually been getting better as they made more games.
They are NOT hurting for funding (Score:5, Insightful)
This makes sense. EA is strapped for cash. It's not like they just designed, developed, leased, furnished, and staffed a couple of storefronts on prime real estate to advertise one game to a limited audience [kotaku.com].
Companies don't know how to manage money anymore. Long term gains (like a productive group with experience working together) are traded for short term gains (advertising gimmicks) so often that nowadays it's just the expected mode of operation.
I don't know too much about Pandemic Studios in particular, but I've been hearing about a LOT of layoffs at EA, and at the same time it's almost like they are throwing money away on brand placement. No company ever thinks to improve their bottom line by steadily generating quality product anymore. The money that goes into solid development is always the dregs of money first given to analysts and marketers.
I'm normally not a foaming-at-the-mouth anti-establishment labor-theory humanist, but things like this (especially with the oft-cited 'global economy') really and truly make me sick.
Re:They are NOT hurting for funding (Score:4, Insightful)
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To be fair, there is very little evidence that EA could, in fact, improve their bottom line by steadily generating quality product. Since they've never managed to steadily generate quality product, we'll never know.
actually EA changed quite a lot in the past few years, take a look at need for speed for example, they were making the same shit every year, this year they changed the developer team and they probably made the best racing game ever, second only to gran turismo. They also produced other great games made by DICE(mirror's edge, battlefield) or BioWare(mass effect, dragon age)
now take a look at activision, they fucked up pc players with no dedicated servers, if that wasn't enough they asked steam to ban/rev
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Shift was a crap game. They released it half-finished, car selection sucks, engine and car tuning is SOOOOO generic, suspension tuning is all bugged out, opposite-lock not required (all cars seem to magically neutral-drift through all corners). I could go on and on. To even suggest that Shift be put anywhere near Gran Turismo or Forza is laughable.
I will admit I really like the direction they took the series and the game sounded GREAT but I think we'll have to wait for Shift 2 or 3 before they've found t
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No company ever thinks to improve their bottom line by steadily generating quality product anymore. The money that goes into solid development is always the dregs of money first given to analysts and marketers.
I'm normally not a foaming-at-the-mouth anti-establishment labor-theory humanist, but things like this (especially with the oft-cited 'global economy') really and truly make me sick.
Blizzard... but they are the major exception to the rule (the Pixar of games?)
Other than that I agree completely about the 'global economy' bs. Not every job is 'cog' job despite management's wet dream fantasies to make it so....
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Blizzard is more than the WoW MMOG crack market that is their most recent creation... Starcraft, Diablo, Warcraft etc...
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Blizzard is more than the WoW MMOG crack market that is their most recent creation... Starcraft, Diablo, Warcraft etc...
True enough, but those other franchises haven't had games released in years. I'm looking forward to that changing. Oh Diablo III, you can't get released soon enough.
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If only someone knew what that "NASCAR" acronym meant!
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They and Bioware only have their freedom as long as every game sells well, as soon as they produce even one stinker, they are screwed.
Happened in the past as well, in case of Origin it was even worse, EA started to talk itself into the decisions even before the first game under their umbrella was released, they did not stand a chance in the first place.
Blizzard is in the same position at Activision as Bioware is in EA, as long as they meet the expectations they have a more or less free reign (although I sti
Re:They are NOT hurting for funding (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't disagree with your stance on EA, but I don't think that EA spending this money on the storefronts in the article is really a big waste.
It's a marketing test bed, basically. Some junior executive somewhere "synergized" the apple store concept and made a couple stores to test out EA Active on their target market, namely moms whose kids have Wiis (I have no doubt these stores were in malls), and to get some feedback on the product. The market for that is gigantic and right now there's only Wii Fit and a handful of others to tap into it.
I don't think a 6 months worth of rent and cheap labor at two locations is more expensive than a large focus study to improve your product or a massive blanket ad campaign that your market won't identify with, each costing millions. Plus their results will be more real and targeted.
And I think 6 months is a good estimate; they won't be around long, I'm sure. Note the decor from the pic in the Kotaku article. Note the lack of permanent fixtures. Stylishly minimalist, yes. Moves out easily, too.
EA has to keep trying things like this. It is a giant lumbering beast, borne of an economic boom and grown under those times of plenty. It consumed its kin and grew more massive still, and now it is a large, unwieldy thing and times are getting slim. It must feed on new cash crops, or limbs begin to wither and fall away. So you'll likely see more gimmick attempts to make a signature brand or one-up breakout successes, any attempt to sustain the creature. I don't think they'll succeed. EA doesn't make games anymore, they just buy people who do.
Sustainability? (Score:2)
Is this model sustainable? With the number of expansions, absorbed companies and conquest, it looks like EA is turning into the GM of gaming. they may be healthy now but what about in a year? 5 years? 10 years? It's like cutting off your pinky to lose weight. It's gone, and never coming back.
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Also, a Spore movie [kotaku.com]. And I think they're making one for Dead Space and maybe The Sims.
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Game publishers spend huge amounts on marketing. Opening a couple of storefronts for a couple of months doesn't even make a dent in their budget. The total cost of this stunt would have covered the salary of one or two programmers for a year, tops.
Which is not to say that this was a good marketing ploy. Indeed, it strikes me as pretty dumb. But it's hardly proof that EA is rolling in cash.
Damn it, EA... (Score:1)
I'll then bankroll a proper Wing Commander game since you people don't seem interested in doing it.
Re:Damn it, EA... (Score:5, Insightful)
EA really is the touch of death.
They suck up a company and intellectual property, they cut the budgets, take over management of the game, and demand a copy be on the shelves six months from three months ago, whether it's ready to go or not. They'll release an alpha build if that's what it takes, then they'll take it out of the ass of the company they bought when the game fails. They never take responsibility for their actions.
I pray EA never comes out with a Wing Commander game. The Command and Conquer days have long since been over, the dream has been killed off. I don't want that to happen to Wing Commander. From my experiences with the SNES Wing Commanders and the Privateer games, I hold those sacred in my heart. EA doesn't need to fuck those up, either, but neither will they sell the IP in fears that it might conflict with Madden games.
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The galling part is that EA will rush to a fire sale and gobble up any IP they can get their hands on and then go out and produce 5 or 6 new series that are similar to the IPs that they just threw hundreds of thousands at. Its like someone there confused patent with trademark.
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The bad thing is, all the yearly sports titles keep EA afloat without them they would have folded a long time ago, but there are literally millions out there in the world who will buy the same game every year on and on just for the updated statistics.
Thanks to those idiots we have to live with EA and thanks to the idiots buying the next incarnation of guitar hero every year, Activision, once a very good publisher pulls the same stunt as EA.
EA tried to break out of that cycle recently, because they know, the
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Wing Commander 4 and Ultima 8 already were developed fully under EA influence, so go figure...
Wing Commander 4 sucked, Ultima 8 while not bad per se was branded as Super Mario Avatar!
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Citation Needed.
Please provide one example of where EA released an alpha build. Or one example of where EA purchased a game already in development and then immediately diverted funds.
As much as you would like EA to be the big bad wolf knocking over studios left and right, the facts are that almost every studio that has gone down in flames under EA's ownership has done so due to its own people dropping the ball.
If you read any of the ex-Pandemic posts you will see that it was local mismanagement which led t
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Tried to play the SNES version one day, it was not that bad it mostly was a 1:1 port of the PC version, Wing Commander 1 was a very basic game to begin with limited by the machines of that time. Wing Commander 2 was the one which gave the series its good name and Wing Commander 3 was the one which made it famous. (And Wing 4 killed it thanks to EAs heavy influence which you can contribute to everything which sucked at part 4)
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Long time, but I do not remember it that way. WC4 was my favourite since it had a solid plot with a few twists, compared to WC3 where Chris Roberts was still experimenting and used the classic evil-aliens-we-must-exterminate plot. For some part of WC4 you could actually choose sides (though the plot had to converge at some point).
What really killed the series was WC5. Bad acting, bad plot, no details ever given about the enemies, gameplay not significantly improved.
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Urgs sorry, I mixed it up, yes Prophecy was the game which took the series down, the first WC where EA had full control because Roberts had gone and people from EA replaced him and his team.
I forgot about the real 4, price of freedom.
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Huh. I was expecting an Ultima whine.
Move along nothing to see (Score:2)
I've lost count of how many studios EA has chewed up and spit out.
This isn't news, it's just more of the same.
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Next ones Bioware... they already are bought, I am just waiting for the first game they did not earn their exepectations, that will be the time EAs screw everything up management will take over and after that we probably will see a Baldurs Gate shooter or Dragon Age Football on a yearly basis and after a while it will be shut down.
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What's worse is it'll be EA's management that causes them to release something half baked and soulless.
Gamasutra job listings (Score:2)
I assume one of the bad management decisions was seemingly spending all their money on Gamasutra job postings? When I was looking around for a new job a couple of years ago it seemed like every other posting was for a position at Pandemic.
EA's management decisions are idiotic! (Score:1, Insightful)
EA's management is the demise of that company. They pull all their developers from games once they are done and leave noone to fix bugs. They very rarely release patches for anything. There are many online games that have had game impacting issues for years that just drive people away. If they were smart they would get on the model of releasing paid items into some of their games to pull in extra revenue. Or releasing more MAP packs for some of their better games that they just mothball. I hope the whole co
Conflict of interest? (Score:4, Interesting)
The interesting part of this is that the CEO had EA purchase his old company for a high amount of $$$ and only two years later shut it down while he personally pocketed several million.
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/96237-Analyst-Chews-Out-EA-CEO-Over-Pandemic-Closure [escapistmagazine.com]
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Bioware also was in his assets, and he sold it off to EA while pocketing the money...
Not sure if this is not insider trading.
From an ex-Pandemite (Score:5, Informative)
I'm an ex-Pandemite.
For me, the turning point was around 2006, with the new hardware generation. There were lots of really passionate people here, but the development and design methodologies that worked well in the previous gen simply did not scale up with the larger projects, and things got confusing and out of hand. This was compounded by each internal team having their own unique technology and tools. The amount of redundancy, knowledge lost and effort wasted between projects was quite substantial, not to mention a somewhat lack of ownership or accountability. I was hoping that Sab would be the turning point, but it looks like it is not to be (good news is that last I heard, all SKUs are golden). I hope that many will be able to enjoy it.
What really irks me is that this was a really passionate and talented bunch with so much potential. Definitely the best group I've had the honor to be with, and possibly ever will be.
Cheers to the 16, 18, and 19.
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Bad management is the cause of so many corporate failures, it amazes me that those with a business degree are not flagged by GOOD company founders to be automatically denied employment. I am serious here, we saw this back in the late 1990s when you had a ton of non-technical people being placed as vice presidents of technical companies, and look at how many of them have crashed since then. Even the whole .com meltdown was caused by too many technical companies being founded by non-technical people with
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Your story is very familiar. Almost every day, a big company buys a little company thinking that a successful small business can become a blockbuster big business with a little infusion of capital and other resources. Some companies know how to pull this off, but it usually seems to fail, both because of the scaling issues you describe and because of the clash of management cultures between the two entities.
I used to work at Sun, and that company made one disastrous acquisition after another. The last one w
Every time they do this... (Score:1)
EA reminds me of something (Score:2, Funny)
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The Star Wars Battlefront PC games were pretty good. The console ports were decent too.
Re:Good (Score:5, Insightful)
Pandemic studios never made anything worth having
I beg to differ. Battlezone 2 was and still is one of the best games ever made, easily one of the most immersive games around, one that never gets stale, which is maybe why it still has a loyal following. What other game from 10 years ago still has new mods coming out, to say nothing of substantial revisions to the original game done by some of the original programmers working on their own time?
Re:Good (Score:4, Informative)
What other game from 10 years ago still has new mods coming out, to say nothing of substantial revisions to the original game done by some of the original programmers working on their own time?
4x4 Evo2 http://vales.com/evo2/default.asp [vales.com]
And yes, I know you were being rhetorical, but you did ask.
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command and conquer. Though I'd say a better comparison would be how many people are willing to buy the game today, vs how much effort the community has put into the game.
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Me and a group of my buddies who were big fans of the Battlezone were actually quite disappointed with the Battlezone 2. The game mechanics and the general feel of the game (not to mention very awkward controls - specially on tracked vehicles) resulted with the game flopping with most of the players of the Activisions' original re-make.
And as to the following, many games have hard-core addicts who try to keep them alive long past the "best before" date. Even the original Battlezone still has servers runnin
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You...are...so...wrong
Destroy All Humans 1 & 2 is damn good game series.
Mercenaries 1 & 2 is also a good games.
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Mercenaries 2 is filed under "Shit, Complete & Total"
It was just another shitty GTA rip-off with uninspired weapons, boring vehicles, a plot that made 30 Days of Night look good, and actually forced you to be a nearly-decent human being (killing innocent civilians has repercussions beyond drawing the attention of enemy forces? lamesauce) instead of a psychotic murdering rapist.
Oh, and the hardest thing in the whole game was not losing the will to live after pressing over 9000 buttons in the same lameass
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Star Wars: Battlefront 1 & 2 says you are wrong.
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Star Wars Battlefront I has shit play control and crap camera behavior (not to mention generally shitty graphics.) Star Wars Battlefront II eliminated everything good about the first game (huge maps, more vehicles) but gave great play control and much better camera behavior. It's hard to say either of them is really a fantastic game; if you put the two of them together, you'd have one fantastic title. I have both, can no longer bring myself to play SWBF I as I always feel like it's cheaped me to death, but
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Yeah, that's basically my experience with them. I still install & play the first one sometimes, mostly to play single-player with bots and do Hoth over and over, or to play the galactic conquest mode or whatever it's called. It's not a great game, but come on, Hoth!
II was terrible, though. Maybe it's better multiplayer?
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