What defunct video game developer would you like to see revived?

It can happen if someone were to buy the company's failed assets and reestablish it. Complete with all of their IPs.

Personally, I would love to see Origin Systems come back from the dead. Maybe a random game creator could buy their assets and properties from EA.

Interplay

badum tish because they died and are now a zombie

Westwood Studios please and for Kane's sake, don't let them be under EA or Activision. Or Ubisoft.

This is stretching it, but 3D Realms and Raven Software as well. They're both still around but old 3D Realms as I know is completely gone and Raven Software became a Call Of Duty DLC factory after their last game Singularity didn't perform so well. (I want my official Herexentic reboot dammit!)

I was about to say Monolith, but they're still active as a distinct part of WBIE.

But you know, sometimes, dead is better. Particularly if you recall how the studios fell apart, Peter Molyneux sinking two different ones by writing checks with his mouth that his ass couldn't cash, Chris Roberts working very hard to become his successor at this, people moving from studio to studio (LGS being a good example, with their top creators being scattered everywhere from 2K to Zenimax these days)... You don't want today's Bungie, for example. Today's Bungie is not the original Halo Bungie, nor is it any of the earlier iterations, be it Oni, Marathon or Myth. Even Bioware has pissed away whatever goodwill people had for them long ago.

And as for the people... if there is a will, there is a way. I once joked that Dishonored was the new, better Thief, and when Thief 4 came out, it turned out to be a bargain-bin Dishonored. Hell, Arkane's Prey is System Shock with Serial Numbers Filed Off. And please remember, Tim Schafer got his shit back together and Psychonauts 2 is coming out.

Luxoflux.

They were responsible for the wonderful games of Kung Fu Panda and Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen.

Imagineer. Mostly to get a new Quest game going.

I don't think Sunsoft, who helped with a different one in the series, is dead?

Say, have any defunct game companies already been revived?

You can just Google the answer you know

I did. Couldn't find any results.

I feel like Team ICO deserves a mention.

Don't they technically still exist as genDESIGN?

Oh yeah I wanted to add one more company and this is also stretching it since they're around but since all they do is The Division nowadays, a mtx infested "live service" game, Ubisoft Massive formerly known as Massive Entertainment.

They used to make great Real-Time Tactics games, like Ground Control, the expansion pack and sequel and World in Conflict. They honed their skills in Wi C.

Then Ubisoft bought them, they sold the rights to Ground Control to Rebellion Developments who still are doing nothing with it for over a decade. Both Ground Control's expansion pack and sequel ended on unresolved cliffhangers.

It hurts.

Edited by Dhiruxide on Jul 26th 2019 at 9:24:12 PM

Speaking of Westwood, imagine if Paradox Interactive bought their assets and revived them.

Whoopie Camp. I want Tomba 3!

I’m willing to give EA a lot more slack than many others are, but damn if they didn’t screw the pooch with Criterion Games after Burnout Paradise.

We did get two Need for Speed games out of them that were fun for a while but didn’t have nearly as much charm or staying power as Paradise, the game that both NFS titles owed much of their mechanics and general design sensibilities to. As a rule, though, NFS made use of cars that actually existed — less Carson GT Concept and Jansen P12, more Chevy Camaro and Lamborghini Countach. With Burnout, Criterion weren’t bound to make licensed vehicles that performed like their real-world counterparts, and instead could do (and did) whatever the hell they wanted — and five games’ worth of fine-tuning their handling and models meant that the vehicles in Paradise felt over the top and were better for it. Even as a kid I knew that there was a je ne sais quoi that was missing from their take on Hot Pursuit, and that willingness to break the rules and amp shit up was what their games relied on. (They got a little bit of it back with Most Wanted, but it was still comparatively hollow.)

After those two games, EA swung the hammer and split the studio into two, sending most of the crew to work on more NFS as part of Ghost Games, with none of the resulting titles being anything worth writing home about. Meanwhile, a skeleton crew stayed on board at Criterion to work on, of all things, stuff for Star Wars Battlefront and Battlefield V, along with an extreme sports racing title that would get a vague behind-the-scenes trailer at E3 before being unceremoniously canned. (Also, apropos of nothing, the new logo is kinda terrible??? I want to like it, but... no.)

The studio’s original founders would end up going independent again as Three Fields Entertainment, and they’ve even made a few spiritual successor titles that pick up where Burnout 3 and Revenge left off, but I really want another open-world racing title in the vein of Paradise. The closest we’ve got right now is maybe Forza Horizon, and that series is great for different reasons, but it doesn’t have the demolition derby-esque, anarchic cool of the Paradise City I once loved.

Edited by Tre on Jul 29th 2019 at 4:09:35 AM

I wonder, has EA ever sold off any of their properties?

Just Smilebit Studio and Day 1 Studios. For the former, I just want a port for Panzer Dragoon Orta that's on the Vita, along with the Switch and PC. For the latter, I would love to see MechAssault 3 becoming a reality. The closest thing to that is the Free Ware Fan Game known as Wolves.

While Treasure is farm from defunct, I wanna see make Gradius VI (and an Updated Re Release of Gradius V for the Playstation Vita with at least two new stages). ^note  A moai stage (stage 6) with a Crystal Moai boss and a water cave stage (stage 7) with a lobster Mini-Boss and branching routes where you fight the respective end-bosses, a serpentine Water Dragon for the top and an Anglerfish Monster for the bottom.

Edited by KJsixteen on Nov 30th 2020 at 8:38:41 AM

What about Clover Studio?

Pandemic Studios, because I want another Mercenaries game dammit.

Superboy, a lot of clover studio's blokes, if I recall correctly, are with platinum games or capcom nowadays. Not ENTIRELY sure though.

Irrational Games, I wanna see another instalment of the SWAT series!

Has genDESIGN released anything?

That's true. Of course the reason why Clover went under was because ALL of their games were commercial bombs. Regardless of whatever acclaim they received from critics.

Do Treasure count? They aren't officially defunct, but haven't made anything in half a decade besides an Ikaruga port for the PS4 in 2018.

Edited by CookingCat on Nov 27th 2020 at 9:02:02 AM

Alpha Dream.

Their bankruptcy still fucking hurts.