Arkane acquired by Zenimax (Bethesda)

[Moonbo]

Interesting news:

http://gamasutra.com/view/news/29879/Be ... Arkane.php

[Jaedar]

This kinda made me happy. Hopefully Dark Messiah 2 now

[Xesum]

Now they just need to buy 2K and Rockstar and then they can be a big player in the games industry.

[Mr_Cyberpunk]

Given the quality of Bethesda Published titles, I'm upset about it. I don't think anything good will come of the deal, at worst this was only a move to steal their IPs- of which they have some of the RPG genres best.. Call me worried about Bethesda trying to create a monopoly over RPGs, this would be a BAD thing, I don't like how their staff thinks, I don't even like how their CEOs think, they all act completely full of themselves and could really give two shits about the quality of their products- I mean this is the same reason everyone hates EA and Activision..

I just love how everyone seems to have forgotten the past 20 years of god awful Bethesda games, just because of 3 GOTY games. I still remember every damn one of them, not only the inhouse ones but even the outsourced ones... terrible terrible games. For all the praise daggerfall gets, it really shouldn't, as ambitious a title as it was at the time, it was buggy as hell to the point of unplayable- and that was the case with majority of the games they released at that time.

What worries me is Oblivion clones coming out the wazoo with well known titles attached, "Dark Messiah of Oblivion" and "Arx Oblivion" will be titles I won't be happy to see. I just prey that the developer is allowed to stay to their own thing and not have to use Beth's god awful Gamebryo engine- at the very best I hope to see some work done with IDTech- Why bethesda still refuses to use IDTech in their products is beyond me.. Its a solid engine, they're stupid if they don't use it.

At the best, hopefully the tallent could turn the publisher around and start making the games we want to see. I doubt it though, Bethesda just disapoints me, and they'll continue to do so.

Now they just need to buy 2K and Rockstar and then they can be a big player in the games industry.

Will never happen, Bethesda are in huge debt from all these buyouts, as I understand they've been taking out massive loans to pay for it- Also 2k is VERY expensive.. I doubt even EA or Warner could now if they wanted to. And I never want to see them become a big player, because that'd mean Design Trends.. and that would be VERY BAD. (so bad that I'd start making games that go against these trends in spite of that. Would create a nice little niche )

As its been said, Expect Obsidian to follow, and then InExile.

Further more, Give it a month or so before Harvey starts bitching again .. I would love to see him go off like he did with Midway.

http://www.joystiq.com/2007/11/30/smith ... -developm/

[Jaedar]

I never really played Arx. I tried the demo, but I couldn't get the bleeding spellcasting system to work, so I never bothered with the real deal.

As its been said, Expect Obsidian to follow

Oh, I really hope not.

[Mr_Cyberpunk]

As its been said, Expect Obsidian to follow

Oh, I really hope not.

Obsidian is a given, once Bethesda sees the profits from New Vegas, they'll offer them money, Naturally their greedy CEO will take it (given how much he lost of Alpha Protocol- his pet project). As for InExile, well the fact that Fargo went with Bethesda lowered his standings with me in my eyes given that a lot of the Interplay guys don't like Bethesda much (kinda doesn't help when you sue them unprovoked ) so I see that as Betraying his own- same goes with Obisidian.. They picked their loyalties, so to hell with them if that's how they want to play. Suffice to say I support Interplay, despite their CEO is also an idiot who ruined the company to begin with when he ignored people's offers to help them during their time of need out of pure arrogance. Still I see Interplay as the lesser of the evils, they got burnt and lately they've been doing some interesting things.. Plus I really badly want Descent 4, and it'd suck if Bethesda killed them.

[Jaedar]

Considering that Obsidian is a sort of Iply refugee, I doubt they'd sell cheaply(and I'm not talking money here). But I think Obsidian could benefit from having a proper publisher... as they really haven't been living up to their potential.

Suffice to say I support Interplay, despite their CEO is also an idiot who ruined the company to begin with when he ignored people's offers to help them during their time of need out of pure arrogance. Still I see Interplay as the lesser of the evils, they got burnt and lately they've been doing some interesting things.. Plus I really badly want Descent 4, and it'd suck if Bethesda killed them.

Interplay is dead. They haven't really done anything for several years.

lot of the Interplay guys don't like Bethesda much (kinda doesn't help when you sue them unprovoked )

Bleh, kill them all and let god sort them out, don't really care who wins the court. The only thing that will change is who gets the MMO rights anyway, right?

[bobby 55]

Oh good lord! Publishers are starting to behave like multi-nationals. I guess the gaming industry is in a healthy state?

[Jaedar]

Oh good lord! Publishers are starting to behave like multi-nationals. I guess the gaming industry is in a healthy state?

EA's been doing stuff like this for a long time. And I don't know about healthy... but certainly lucrative

But Zenimax have been pushing pretty hard lately...

[bobby 55]

Oh good lord! Publishers are starting to behave like multi-nationals. I guess the gaming industry is in a healthy state?

EA's been doing stuff like this for a long time. And I don't know about healthy... but certainly lucrative

Heheheh, yeah lucrative suits better. Still, while they're making money the opportunity for some great games being developed is there.... if the publishers would let the developers do their thing without too much interference.

[Jaedar]

Oh good lord! Publishers are starting to behave like multi-nationals. I guess the gaming industry is in a healthy state?

EA's been doing stuff like this for a long time. And I don't know about healthy... but certainly lucrative

Heheheh, yeah lucrative suits better. Still, while they're making money the opportunity for some great games being developed is there.... if the publishers would let the developers do their thing without too much interference.

Publisher interference can be a good thing. Today, its often seen as a bad thing because of the DRM and stuff, but it should be noted that some people prosper under pressure, and pubs can be quite supportive.

But in the ideal world, a publisher would be the realist to the developers artistry, keeping them grounded and making sure something with quality comes out in the end. An example of this is the people who published The Void, BitComposer(whose portfolio is completely unimpressive), whom the main dev have spoken quite well about, saying stuff like they sponsored a complete rewrite of the script(it was allegedly quite messy, but I wouldn't mind seeing the original... oh well) and a lot of balance and polishing. They made enough changes to warrant a russian rerelease, so there was two versions of The Void on russian shelves for a while

It's just that devs and pubs are so secretive these days... so we only really see the bad stuff I suspect. Oh and pubs need to start accepting risks too, that would be great thanks. Not every game has to cost several million dollars to develop and have mainstream appeal, I just wish someone funded, say, professional 2d games with niche appeal(which would be fine, because they would cost a fraction of what a AAA cost to develop).

But now I'm just dreaming/ranting.

[Mr_Cyberpunk]

Considering that Obsidian is a sort of Iply refugee, I doubt they'd sell cheaply(and I'm not talking money here). But I think Obsidian could benefit from having a proper publisher... as they really haven't been living up to their potential.

Suffice to say I support Interplay, despite their CEO is also an idiot who ruined the company to begin with when he ignored people's offers to help them during their time of need out of pure arrogance. Still I see Interplay as the lesser of the evils, they got burnt and lately they've been doing some interesting things.. Plus I really badly want Descent 4, and it'd suck if Bethesda killed them.

Interplay is dead. They haven't really done anything for several years.

lot of the Interplay guys don't like Bethesda much (kinda doesn't help when you sue them unprovoked )

Bleh, kill them all and let god sort them out, don't really care who wins the court. The only thing that will change is who gets the MMO rights anyway, right?

Firstly, Obsidian definately is an Iply refugee, however the people that worked for Interplay don't control how the company works, and their track record is that the CEO only cares about himself not the company. Further more Bethesda will just take out another stupidly massive loan if they wanted to take over Obsidian, this is why Carmack sold out to them. Interplay never would and Bethesda would never offer it to them, they want to destroy interplay and rape its corpse when its all over- this entire court case was bad business by Bethesda, Interplay didn't do anything wrong at all because when they sold the Fallout Trilogy they were licensed to do so and even then it clearly stated on the box what you were buying.. Since then the court has been ruling in favor of interplay, hence why Fallout Online was allowed to still keep in development- I also think Bethesda's legal team are complete idiots, evident by how many times they've submitted name calling as evidence only for the Judge to throw it out of court (the transcripts are very funny if you get the chance to read them.. though since then Beth's been shuffling their legal teams.. though unsuccessfuly still).

Interplay has the chance to make a comeback, it can still make money off of the many classic games they can sell and this can then fund newer games (like Descent 4).

Bethesda keeps on giving us evidence to consider them un-sportingly towards business relations. I would NEVER work with these pricks.

[Jetsetlemming]

Some of the short sighted responses in this thread are funny. This is actually great news as Arkane was in serious trouble. The Crossing was put on hold because they had run out of money- the studio was on life support. This means that now they might actually be able to make a game instead of just being an entity that we occasionally think of and go "Dark Messiah and Arx Fatalis were good" and go back to playing other games.

And it would also be good news if Zenimax bought Obsidian, because that studio isn't far behind Arkane's situation. If it weren't for the New Vegas contract being in place before AP's release the studio might've end up shut down. AP did absolutely terribly.

[Mr_Cyberpunk]

You might not be saying that after they actually release their game Jet. Just saying. This is Bethesda here, they'll always try to make you think the game stands a chance at being great, and then when its released you discover they had a lot of problems that the publisher just outright ignored for the duration- as has been the case with so many of their collaborators. Just refering to history here as an example of what might happen- who knows though, they might buck the trend- I'm doubtful though.

If it weren't for the New Vegas contract being in place before AP's release the studio might've end up shut down. AP did absolutely terribly.

This is true. New Vegas will no doubt sell only because of the fan dollars, its fortunate that they even got the chance to do the game. However yeah the studio isn't going so well and I'm doubtful New Vegas' success would be enough to secure their independance. It could go differently though and Obsidian could end up under Sega.. but that wouldn't be any better, Sega are just as worse a publisher however.

[Jetsetlemming]

I have a far better opinion of Bethesda than you do. Regardless, internal Bethesda development policy does not necessarily reflect how Zenimax owned studios might be managed. The only non-Beth Zenimax published game I know of that's come out so far is Rogue Warrior, and let's face it, Rebellion has been going downhill for years. You can't blame that game on anyone but them.

Anyway, ignoring all that, even if Bethesda makes all Arkane games irrevocably shit, I would prefer those guys be employed than unemployed. Same with the Obsidian crew.