Electronic Arts announced that it has secured a multi-year, multi-title licensing agreement with Disney to create multiple Star Wars games. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, nor were any of the games that EA plans on making. The announcement was made by President of EA Labels Frank Gibeau on EA's official blog.
After the news yesterday that Disney was shutting down LucasArts, Raven Software decided that it was a good time to release the source code to two of its Star Wars-themed action games, Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast and Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy.
Disney is closing LucasArts, the game development studio that has been a part of the LucasFilms family for decades. Disney said that its shift from an internal development model to a licensing model means that it needs to minimize its risks for its "broader portfolio" of games.
When it was revealed earlier this year that Clint Hocking had left LucasArts, people speculated where he would be going to next. Yesterday it was revealed that the former creative director at both Ubisoft and LucasArts, has joined Valve Software, though what his role will be there was not determined. Hocking is best known for his work on such titles as Far Cry 2 and the Splinter Cell series.
It's always interesting when a developer becomes so disgruntled with a former publishing partner that they are willing to let it all hang out and say what is really on their minds. Several ex-Free Radical developers feels so strongly about their former publisher that they referred to them collectively as "psychopaths" in a recent conversation with Eurogamer.
Lucas Licensing, the licensing arm of Lucasfilms, has renewed its lucrative Star Wars deal with The LEGO Group. The deal extends LEGO's popular toy line for another ten years. LEGO secured the original deal way back in 1999. The deal helped LEGO create the first product based on a third-party license. Since that time, LEGO has created toys based on such as popular franchises Harry Potter, Indiana Jones and Batman.
After reports of Star Wars: The Old Republic early access users complaining about queues to get into game servers that lasted multiple hours, BioWare has said publicly that they are looking into the issue. The game is set to launch officially tomorrow. Jeff Hickman, Executive Producer – Live Services posted the following message on the official SWTOR web site:
For those of you still waiting to get into Star Wars: The Old Republic - a privilege you earned by pre-ordering the game, we might add - BioWare offers some good news: they are offering a two-day grace period for Star Wars: The Old Republic customers. The move is meant to reward fans who pre-ordered but have yet to get early access to the game. They are concerned about getting it in time for the December 20 launch of the game.
Star Wars Galaxies, the popular MMO created by Sony Online Entertainment and LucasArts is shutting down by year's end. SOE announced that it planned to shut down the Star Wars themed MMO in December of this year. They are doing this, they say, to switch the focus on the next Star Wars MMO, The Old Republic.
SOE president John Smedley said the closure of SWG will not affect the team because it will be transferred to an undisclosed project in Austin.
An official letter to SWG players was posted on the forums, laying out the bad news:
Those speculating on where Clint Hocking, former Ubisoft Montreal creative director, would end up can be put to rest today. Hocking has taken a job at Lucas Arts as creative director on an upcoming and as-of-yet unannounced project. Hocking left Ubisoft Montreal after serving as the company's creative director for nearly nine years. Hocking made his intentions to leave the company publicly on his blog earlier this year, saying: "I am too comfortable. I am too content. And I know where that can lead for me. Fortunately, for the first time in my life, I know the way forward," he wrote in May on his personal blog.
Today LucasArts confirmed that the man who helped steer such franchises as Splinter Cell and Far Cry was now working at the company:
"We are pleased to announce that Clint Hocking has joined LucasArts as creative director on an unannounced project," a LucasArts representative told GameSpot.
Hopefully we'll hear more about this project that Hocking is working on and why he thought it was important enough to jump ship to LucasArts.
Jim Ward, who left the CEO job at video game publisher LucasArts in early 2008, is now hoping to win a seat in Congress.
Ward, a Republican who currently works as a venture capitalist, is running to represent Arizona's 5th Congressional District. That seat is currently held by two-term Democrat Harry Mitchell. The district includes Scottsdale, Tempe and parts of Phoenix.
Ward outlines his philosophy on his campaign website:
I’m not a professional politician. I’m a businessman. And I don’t disagree that this country needs change. But, in my experience, there’s the right kind of change and the wrong kind of change. I believe what’s happening to this country represents the wrong kind of change...
Ward lists his political philosophy as conservative on Facebook. He has protested (see pic at left) against President Obama's healthcare plan.
Partially via: Kotaku
Randy Stude, president of the PC Gaming Alliance, seems perfectly willing to cut right through the video game industry's party line on piracy.
Gotta love that.
In separate interviews published today, Stude dismissed dire industry claims that publishers would give up on PC games over the piracy issue. Then he slapped LucasArts for its approach to PC gaming.
On the piracy issue, Stude told Gamasutra:
The [online game] revenues being generated [in China and Korea] just blow the mind. You're talking almost 5 billion dollars. Almost half the world's PC software revenues are coming from marketplaces that have almost no retail at all...
You look at a game like Spore… despite the fact it's pirated out there on torrent networks, its selling great by any standard... it sort of bucks the notion that all games are going to be destroyed because of piracy. That's not the case...
I'm not saying that the [PC gaming] industry needs to accept piracy. I'm saying that if there’s nothing that can be done, the assumption that gaming will die on a platform is ridiculous.
LucasArts was taken to task over a producer's comment that Star Wars: The Force Unleashed wouldn't be ported to PC due to the challenge of developing for a broard range of PC configurations. Stude told gamesindustry.biz:
That's not an educated answer. In the last several years there have been at least 100 million PCs sold that have the capabilities or better of an Xbox 360. It's ridiculous to say that there's not enough audience for that game potentially and that it falls into this enthusiast extreme category when ported over to the PC. That's an uneducated response...
LucasArts hasn't made a good PC game in a long time. That's my opinion... I think the last good PC game they made was probably Jedi Knight 2... So I can understand why they would make that call.
Reporter Mike Musgrove digs into the ESA's recent difficulties in today's Washington Post.
Musgrove brings an interesting perspective to the piece, given that he wrote one of the early profiles of embattled ESA CEO Michael Gallagher last September. In response to Musgrove's questions about losing Activision, Vivendi, LucasArts and id as member companies, Gallagher said:
There are hundreds of trade associations in Washington and virtually all feature member turnover and the ESA is no exception.
Increased membership fees due to the scaling back of E3 may be part of the problem, Musgrove reports, quoting Wedbush-Morgan analyst Michael Pachter:
These [publishers] got rid of E3 so they wouldn't be spending money, and they suddenly find they are spending the same amount of money, but without the spectacle of E3. I can't comment on whether the ESA is effective or not, but clearly several members decided that this is not the kind of reward they expect for that amount spent.
For the industry's largest players, those fees could be $4.5 million or more per year. id CEO Todd Hollenshead also cited membership fees:
Our departure from ESA is probably temporary and was not political. It was just a question of other priorities this year that we wanted to focus on... [The ESA] is a credit to the industry.
Hal Halpin, president of the Entertainment Consumers Association (ECA), told Musgrove he knew of two other (unnamed) publishers that are planning to drop their ESA membership status:
Several [other publishers] are unhappy but remain with the organization... It's really concerning for all of us. Anyone who cares about the games business should be concerned about what's going on with the ESA.
Musgrove noted that Gallagher has maintained a relatively low profile since taking over the reigns, and that support was top-tier game publishers seems less effusive than it was in 2007:
[Gallagher's] been kind of quiet since that [September WaPo profile]... After a Fox News show featured an uninformed pundit going off about the allegedly sexually explicit nature of... Mass Effect, some gamers complained that the ESA did not step in to defend the game industry...
While top-ranking game industry executives were quick to get on the phone or respond to my e-mail queries about Gallagher last year, they weren't as chatty this year... Last year, Robbie Bach, head of Microsoft's game division, got on the phone to sing Gallagher's praises. This year, Microsoft sent me a statement: "We're as committed as ever to the ESA, and we look forward to participating in E3 this summer." Nintendo released a shorter, nine-word statement along the same lines.
For his part, Gallagher told Musgrove:
When it's necessary for the industry to have that loud, clear and public voice to defend itself from a baseless attack, I will be there.
Full Disclosure Dept: The ECA is the parent company of GamePolitics…
Following Activision and Vivendi out the door, LucasArts has made its exit from the Entertainment Software Association official.
GamePolitics broke the news last week that signs pointed to LucasArts leaving the organization which represents the interests of US video game publishers.
Since that time, both LucasArts and the ESA went into silent mode - until late today (Friday afternoons being the corporate mind's preferred time for dropping bad news).
Despite giving the kiss-off to ESA, LucasArts says that it will still exhibit at E3 in July.
We should note that while working on this story no fewer than five LucasArts PR reps failed to return GP's phone calls, e-mails and IM's. The ESA also chose not to respond. Notice that nobody was denying the rumor. Obviously, there was a good reason for that.
Joystiq has the ESA's press release, which the publisher's group did not deign to send to GamePolitics. I assume that's by way of payback for reporting the rumor.
Classy.
Last week, GamePolitics first began to suspect that Activision and Vivendi might have left the Entertainment Software Association (ESA) after noticing that the game publishing giants were no longer listed on the member section of the ESA website.
Today there is another major company missing from that list: LucasArts
We've got messages out to several LucasArts contacts in an attempt to confirm. An ESA representative promised us he would "look into that."
So, we'll call this one officially a rumor... for now.
But if true, the exit of LucasArts immediately on the heels of Activision and Vivendi could signal that the ESA, founded in 1994 to represent the interests of US video game publishers, is rapidly taking on water.
Technogeek: If the developer were male there wouldn't have been a "conversation" in the first place.10/19/2014 - 2:27am
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Monte: trolls are just at their absolute worst when it comes to women and feminist. You could bet good money that if the developer were male the trolls would be silent and the conversation would actually focus on the journalism.10/18/2014 - 9:18pm
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Monte: Papa: Not the first time we've had a journalism scandals before, but the harassment never got close to this level; the difference with this scandal is that feminists are involved. Without the feminist angle, their would be A LOT less harrassment10/18/2014 - 9:15pm
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Papa Midnight: Monte: That's honestly rather short-sighted. As has been proven with other persons who have been targeted, if it wasn't Quinn, it would be someone else.10/18/2014 - 6:26pm
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Avalongod: I think that's part of what gives an esoteric news story like this real life...it taps into a larger narrative about misogyny in society outside of games.10/18/2014 - 3:29pm
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Avalongod: @Monte, well the trolls made death threats that came to police (and media attention). I think this is tapping into a larger issue outside of games about how women are treated in society (like all the "real rape" stuff during the last election)10/18/2014 - 3:28pm
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Wonderkarp: Zippy : Havent tried the PS4 controller. might later.10/18/2014 - 2:37pm
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Monte: Seirously, If Quinn was not involved and GG was instead about something like the Mordor Marketing contracts, the trolling would have never grown so vile and disgusting. There have been plenty of movements in the past that never sufferred from behavior..10/18/2014 - 1:57pm
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Monte: We have seen scandel's before but the trolling has never been as vile as what we see with GG. Trolls usually have such a tiny voice you can barely notice them, but its like moths to a flame whenever femistist are involved.10/18/2014 - 1:53pm
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ZippyDSMlee: Wonderkarp: You might be able to if you had a PS4 controller.10/18/2014 - 1:00pm
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MaskedPixelante: http://store.steampowered.com/app/327940/ Night Dive starts charging for freeware.10/18/2014 - 12:21pm
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Matthew Wilson: the sad thing is there are trolls on both sides of this. people need to stop acting like their side is so pure.10/18/2014 - 12:19pm
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MechaTama31: So, only speak out on a scandal that hasn't attracted trolls? I wouldn't hold my breath...10/18/2014 - 10:49am
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Monte: I feel like GG just needs to die. The movement is FAR to tainted by hatred and BS for it to be useful for any conversation. Let GG die, and then rally behind the NEXT gaming journalism scandal, and start the conversation fresh.10/18/2014 - 10:33am
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quiknkold: and we dont have a Dovakin to call a cease fire10/17/2014 - 7:37pm
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quiknkold: The whole thing is Futile. Both sides are so buried deep in their trenchs that there isnt a conversation. Its just Finger Pointing, Name Calling, Doxxing, Threats. there needs to be a serious conversation, and GG isnt it.10/17/2014 - 7:37pm
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quiknkold: I thought it was a good article. Jeff is right. I feel like GamerGate did destroy its message. I am for Ethics in game journalism, but man. so much hate. and its on both sides. I've seen some awful stuff spewed on twitter. Its a big reason why I exited..10/17/2014 - 7:34pm
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Matthew Wilson: while he focused on gg, he did call out both sides crap.10/17/2014 - 7:18pm
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Papa Midnight: That was a damn good read offered by Jeff Gertsmann.10/17/2014 - 7:17pm
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Matthew Wilson: http://www.giantbomb.com/articles/letter-from-the-editor-10-17-2014/1100-5049/ deferentially a nice write up.10/17/2014 - 6:44pm
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