Pandemic Studios
 | |
| Company type | Subsidiary of Electronic Arts |
|---|---|
| Industry | Software & Programming |
| Founded | Santa Monica, California (1998) |
| Defunct | 2009 |
| Headquarters | Los Angeles, California |
Key people | Andrew Goldman, CEO Josh Resnick, President |
| Products | Full Spectrum Warrior Star Wars: Battlefront (I & II) Destroy All Humans! (1 & 2) Mercenaries series (See complete products listing) |
| Website | www.pandemicstudios.com |
Pandemic Studios was originally founded as an independent developer in 1998, it became a Electronic Arts-owned developer from 2007 to 2009, when it was officially closed. It was an American video game developer with offices in Los Angeles, California. The studio is notable for featuring fully-destructible environments in its games. Notable titles include Full Spectrum Warrior, Star Wars: Battlefront, Destroy All Humans! and Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction.
History
The company's president was Josh Resnick and its CEO was Andrew Goldman — both formerly worked at Activision, and Pandemic was founded with an equity investment by Activision in 1998. Pandemic's first two games, Battlezone II and Dark Reign 2, were both sequels to Activision games.
In 2000, Pandemic opened a satellite studio in the Brisbane suburb of Fortitude Valley. The first project was Army Men RTS, a console RTS game using the Dark Reign 2 engine. This studio would later develop Destroy All Humans!.
In 2003, the Los Angeles studio moved from its founding location at Santa Monica to a high-rise building in Westwood.
In November 2005, it was announced that Pandemic and BioWare would be joining forces, with private equity fund Elevation Partners investing in the partnership. However, both companies will retain their brands and identities[1].
On October 11, 2007, it was announced that VG Holding Corp, the owners of Bioware and Pandemic Studios, would be acquired by Electronic Arts as of January 2008, subject to FTC approval.[2]
In February 2009, their office in Brisbane, Australia was shut down.[3]
In November 2009, Electronic Arts cut a total of 1500 jobs which affected various studios, including a complete shutdown of Pandemic. On November 17, 2009, EA officially confirmed Pandemic Studios' closure, laying off 228 employees. EA absorbed 35 Pandemic employees to support The Saboteur and an unannounced project.[4] In response, a few former employees of Pandemic created an Office Space-style video where they're shown mercilessly smashing their office printer.[5]
Teams
At the time of closing, several development teams existed inside Pandemic:
- Full Spectrum Warrior team, responsible for the original game as well as its sequel, Full Spectrum Warrior: Ten Hammers.
- Star Wars team, who developed the Star Wars: Battlefront series,
- Mercenaries team, has recently finished production on Mercenaries 2: World in Flames, which was released on August 31st 2008, published by EA Games.
- The Saboteur team, who are currently developing the game The Saboteur which is a game chronicling the adventures of a French resistance fighter during WWII.
- The Brisbane Team was working on many projects, including Projects B and Q, The Dark Knight video game, and The Next Big Thing (an episodic Wii game), when their branch was closed. All the games they had in production were canceled. The team was the first team part of Pandemic Studios to close, closing in 2008, one year prior to the main studios' closing.
Games
Pandemic Studios developed the first two main titles of the successful Star Wars: Battlefront series namely Star Wars: Battlefront and Star Wars: Battlefront II as well as Full Spectrum Warrior and the Mercenaries series. The studio also developed the last game in the Army Men series published by 3DO, Army Men RTS. The studio was also responsible for developing the first two games in the Destroy All Humans! series. The studio's final project released was The Saboteur.
At time of closure the studio still had multiple projects in development namely Project X and Y which are listed on Pandemic's Official Site. Project X has been listed since 2007 while Project Y was recently listed in 2009. Both projects were rumored to be based on the Mercenaries franchise. Many projects that were being developed at Pandemic's Brisbane studios were also cancelled when it closed including The Dark Knight and two unannounced games, Project B and Q, were in development at time of closure. The listings of Project B and Q disappeared from Pandemic's Official Site on the day of the Brisbane Studio's closure.
| Release Date |
Title | Genre/Notes |
|---|---|---|
| 1999 | Battlezone II | First-person shooter, real-time strategy |
| 2000 | Dark Reign 2 | real-time strategy |
| 2002 | Triple Play 2002 | Sports |
| Army Men RTS | real-time strategy | |
| Star Wars: The Clone Wars | Action | |
| 2004 | Full Spectrum Warrior | Real-time tactics, Combat Simulation |
| Star Wars: Battlefront | First-person shooter, third-person shooter | |
| 2005 | Star Wars: Battlefront II | First-person shooter, third-person shooter |
| Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction | Third-person shooter | |
| Destroy All Humans! | Third-person shooter, Adventure | |
| 2006 | Full Spectrum Warrior: Ten Hammers | Real-time tactics, Combat Simulation |
| Destroy All Humans! 2 | Third-person shooter, Adventure | |
| 2008 | Mercenaries 2: World in Flames | Third-person shooter |
| 2009 | The Lord of the Rings: Conquest | Action |
| The Saboteur | Action/adventure, Third-person shooter, Stealth, Sandbox | |
| Status Unknown | Project X[6] | Initially rumored to be Star Wars: Battlefront III, but later debunked[7][8] |
| Project Y[9] | ||
| Cancelled | The Dark Knight[10] | |
| Project B | Either Project B or Q was The Next Big Thing, previously titled No Limits Racing, for the Wii. The project was supposed to utilize Mii's and feature celebrity cameos like Mr. T and David Hasselhoff. | |
| Project Q |
References
- ^ Bioware & Pandemic Merge - TotalGaming.net news, 3 November, 2005
- ^ EA To Acquire BioWare Corp. and Pandemic Studios
- ^ "Pandemic Brisbane Shut Down". Ausgamers.com. 2009-02-11. Retrieved 2009-02-12.
- ^ Brian Crecente (November 17, 2009). "Confirmed: EA Closes Pandemic Studios, Says Brand Will Live On". Kotaku. Retrieved November 17, 2009.
- ^ GameKiq (November 23, 2009). "This is the Way to Go Out: Pandemic Says Goodbye". GameKiq. Retrieved November 23, 2009.
- ^ Secret Projects
- ^ Pandemic Studios Forums Post
- ^ Article later posted
- ^ Current Projects Site
- ^ http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/88736-Screwing-Up-Batman