N64 bioware games
While this industry has a knack for forgetting the past, it can be paradoxically great at holding grudges. Origin lasted almost a dozen years, but the last few were focused exclusively on supporting Ultima Online even as it faded in relevance compared to newer MMOs like EverQuest.ĮA's reputation for ruining companies it acquires was perhaps a bit unfair - Tiburon, Maxis, DICE, and Criterion all exist and have enjoyed some of their biggest successes since acquisition - but Origin, Bullfrog, and Westwood had especially devoted fanbases to bemoan their fates. Westwood was gone in five years, Bullfrog in six. There were some post-acquisition success stories among those studios, but within a few years fans noticed that some of the talent they knew by name was leaving, games were getting cancelled, and the quality of the games that did make it to release was sometimes lacking.Īll three studios were shut down or consolidated into the publisher's larger operation. We can trace them back to at least the '90s, when the publisher acquired beloved developers like Origin Systems, Bullfrog Productions, and Westwood Studios. What's in a Name?Įlectronic Arts has had reputation problems for a very long time.
So to refresh our collective memory and perhaps offer some perspective on our field's history, runs this monthly feature highlighting happenings in gaming from exactly a decade ago. That said, even an industry so entrenched in the now can learn from its past. The games industry moves pretty fast, and there's a tendency for all involved to look constantly to what's next without so much worrying about what came before.