The Infinity Ward Implosion

[rainless]

Oh glorious day...

Just as predicted (by me of course) the walls at Infinity Ward are tumbling down.

The company once proud enough to sell its game for $10 more than every other game on the market is now routinely on sale, every week, for $20 less than every game on the market, the President and VP were both dragged out of their offices by security and fired, and most of the devs have quit.

Ladys and Gentlemen, I give you Infinity Ward 2010:

http://www.explicitgamer.com/blog/2010/04/infinity-ward-loses-7-more-developers/

Economic Karmatic Revenge.

[SteveLord]

Wish it were Ubisoft instead.

[rainless]

Wish it were Ubisoft instead.

We should be so lucky!

I think they were tied up with (or possibly still are) Vivendi Universal at some point.

At one point I could've sworn that company was going over... but they proved resilient at the last second like the French at the end of the 100 years war.

[Omsion]

At one point I could've sworn that company was going over... but they proved resilient at the last second like the French at the end of the 100 years war.That's an interesting way of putting it :p

[ps2cho]

Anyone want to give me quick cliffs on the whole deal with Infinity Ward? Is this a good thing?

[disk11]

The incident: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2010/03/insubordination-infinity-ward-cofounder-gone-from-activision.ars

The two sides are now suing each other, the two Infinity Ward guys have a new studio called Resapwn, and apparently IW devs are jumping ship.

In a way, I think it'll be a good thing. Activision has shown it intends to milk its IP to the breaking point (look at Guitar Hero), and I think have 3 CoD games planned for the next two years, and want to charge monthly to play CoD online. Bobby Kotick has also said many inflammatory things. In many ways, Activision is the new EA.

[Janus67]

A lot of them are leaving Infinity Ward/Activision (because of Activision) and are probably going to switch to the new EA studio: 'Respawn Games' or something like that, founded by the old founders of IW that were 'fired' a few months ago.

Cliffnotes version: The founders were fired before they were due bonuses/etc for some BS reasons by Activision. They sued the company to get the 36 million (or whatever value it was) and during the law suits, a lot of people left IW for similar reasons I believe.



I'm happy and sad to see it happen to Activision, as they were a great publisher, but since the Activision/Blizzard merger I've seen WoW go down hill quite a bit (all this microtransaction bull, etc).

[freakdiablo]

In a way, I think it'll be a good thing. Activision has shown it intends to milk its IP to the breaking point (look at Guitar Hero), and I think have 3 CoD games planned for the next two years, and want to charge monthly to play CoD online. Bobby Kotick has also said many inflammatory things. In many ways, Activision is the new EA.

Now that right there is just plain dirty. I'll wait to see the quality of the 3 games, but the paying monthly for online play is disturbing. Unless it's going to be some MMO type thing that requires large amounts of bandwidth and storage space, I'm finding a hard way to say why besides greed.

[disk11]

Here's the subscription quote: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2010/02/activision-hints-at-call-of-duty-subs-less-guitar-hero.ars

And for the new games: http://www.crunchgear.com/2010/04/22/is-3-call-of-duty-games-in-less-than-2-years-overkill-if-not-its-awfully-close/

And I think one of those is supposed to be an "action/adventure".

[Twigglish]

Here's the subscription quote: http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2010/02/activision-hints-at-call-of-duty-subs-less-guitar-hero.ars

And for the new games: http://www.crunchgear.com/2010/04/22/is-3-call-of-duty-games-in-less-than-2-years-overkill-if-not-its-awfully-close/

And I think one of those is supposed to be an "action/adventure".

Wow and wow. Both of those are absurd. I won't be caught up in the money swindling.

[TommyHolly]

We should be so lucky!

I think they were tied up with (or possibly still are) Vivendi Universal at some point.

At one point I could've sworn that company was going over... but they proved resilient at the last second like the French at the end of the 100 years war.

Seeing how King Edward III (Edward of Windsor) was both the King of England and was in line for the throne of France, the Vivendi Universal tie is applicable. So who gets to play Joan of Arc and get burned at the stake?

[rainless]

Seeing how King Edward III (Edward of Windsor) was both the King of England and was in line for the throne of France, the Vivendi Universal tie is applicable. So who gets to play Joan of Arc and get burned at the stake?

That would be the PC gamers.

[rumbl3]

Well only product i'll touch coming from them is D3 aslong as they don't completely end up killing it.

As for cod rip. It's ok tho Bad company 2 is cod and the bag of chips :). Activisions lose is ea's gain?

[tinymouse2]

Go Valve! :D They will rule the industry someday!

Is there a graph of gross income of all the game companies? Would be interesting to see how everyone's doing.

[Jawsome]

I knew my boycott of Modern Warfare 2 would leave Infinity Ward in shambles.

I just knew it.

[TommyHolly]

LOL

[freakdiablo]

I knew my boycott of Modern Warfare 2 would leave Infinity Ward in shambles.

I just knew it.

They'll say since you didn't go out and buy a copy the day it was released you pirated it :D

[SeasonalEclipse]

They'll say since you didn't go out and buy a copy the day it was released you pirated it :D

Shh be quiet, that starts trends.. Badddd trends.

[tinymouse2]

Wha? Us? Talking about Pirating? Please mods we would NEVER do that! We sweardz it!

[TheGreySpectre]

The two heads of infinity ward went off to form Respawn Studios with EA as the publisher. A good portion of the Infinity ward higher ups have left infinity ward, as of the morning the latest numbers I saw were a total of 26 members of IW have left. A good portion have not actually announced what studio they are going to after quitting IW, however it has been assumed that they will join Respawn.

At this point with 25% of the company gone, and if nothing else all the leads gone I would say Infinity ward is essentially dead in the water. I would guess Acitivsion will merge in another developer like treyarch (sp?) to make the future modern warfare games so that they can keep the infinity ward name, which has decent name recognition even outside "hardcore" communities.

Personally I will be paying attention to what Respawn is developing as it seems to pretty much be IW without activision exploitation.

link (http://kotaku.com/5525152/eight-more-leave-modern-warfare-developers-bringing-total-to-26)
link (http://kotaku.com/5515263/ex+modern-warfare-creators-havent-hatched-new-game-idea-yet-wont-make-battlefield)

[Omsion]

List here, apparently:
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=392747

Also, a bunch of them employees are suing Activision now as well.

[Janus67]

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2010/04/infinity-ward-staff-sues-activision-for-500-million.ars?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss

[lordkosc]

Pffft , 500$ million is what Kotick uses to support his bed mattress.