Anime Pulse

In the era of EA the Studio Killer, and smaller independent Studios closing down for their own reasons, what are your thoughts on the closure of a Studio for what ever reason?

~Aki
(wording by Vailreth <3)

Luckily I can say that most of the studios that I enjoy games from are still in business but if I had to mention one I suppose it'd be Hudson Soft, the same company that brought us the Mario Party series and of course Bomberman. What ends this on a sweeter note is that many Hudson employees are still in the industry. Some for Nd Cube, a subsidiary of Nintendo that makes Mario Party Games to this day, which is headed by Hidetoshi Endo, a former Hudson Soft President. Also Bomberman is thankfully not dead getting a game on the Switch and an appearance in the next Smash. Still bitter that he will not be playable though...

My thoughts are that it's sad and tragic. It is endemic of the industry that many, if not, all employees in Development Studios can be hired and fired at will. Rather than write my usual patented "Wall of Text! (tm)", I will link you to the Jimquisition video on the subject that probably outlines better than I can why studio closures are a thing, the underlying causes behind it and why they will keep happening until drastic changes happen in the games industry.


youtu.be/gXFKnkTr4Rk

I know that no matter the reason a studio closes, it means that people are out on their ass without a job. Considering that, what is most sad for me is when a little company creates a neat game, but then they don't have enough ability to continue past that. There are a lot of companies EA gobbled up, but these companies had to sign off on the acquisition. I love indies that rise up and grow, bringing new IPs into the mix.

Telltale Games was sad because of a) horrible mismanagement and b) promising a new game engine barely a month or so before they died!

It always saddens me to see a studio closed down.The biggest thing it means to me that there will be less variety in games. What makes me more angry is why most of these closures are happening, due to the poor management skills of the heads, publishers, or shareholders. I can only stand to see a game become popular, only to have meddling executives botch and hollow out what made it great until it's a shell of it's former self. Then they wonder why it doesn't sell.

I think it really sucks when studios close. Although its sad when they close I'd rather them close then be bought by a big company **cough EA cough** and have that company force them to make terrible games and eventually lead to their sad demise.

I consider an acquisition by a big pub like EA or Activision to be no different than a closure. Sooner or later it happens.
Thus I bid a fond farewell to Obsidian, swallowed into Microsoft like so many others.

It's really sad when companies close down. I do not wish that on anyone. One of my best friends had that happen to her a few years ago but atleast she was forewarn by her job and they did give the employees 2 months severance pay. That's probably the best case scenario unlike what happen to the Telltale employees who were fire unexpectedly and didn't at any pay. I really think they should have a law in place to protect employees from layoffs and company closures. But on a lighter note The Walking Dead Finale season got pickup by another company so at its gonna get finished and perhaps give some of the employees a job for a while.