One of the great downfalls of an acquisition or merger, in the game industry, is the loss of great franchise titles. Sierra, or Sierra Online, once stood on its own as a company with great gaming titles but later fell into the depths of Hades under many different company names.
Sierra’s last stop on the acquisition highway was Vivendi, years after much of Sierra’s steam had slowed. Now, they’re part of Activision Blizzard so we had high hopes they’d find a great use for some of the old Sierra properties long since collecting dust. Space Quest, Kings Quest, Leisure Suit Larry and especially Gabrielle Knight were some of our favorites, but times have changed.
“We are retaining only those franchises that are a strong fit with our long-term strategy including Crash Bandicoot, Ice Age and Spyro, as well as Prototype and a second game that has not yet been announced. We will not publish any other titles that previously were part of the Vivendi Games portfolio and we are currently reviewing our options regarding those titles,” says Activision Blizzard (joystiq)
This is unfortunate news, Activision Blizzard now has a large set of franchises on their hands, many of which have collected dust for years. Those dust collecting franchises could rise from the dead and reinvigorate their old fan base… or be dropped to the earth as unwanted scrapes after a big hunt with the vultures awaiting their take (sorry, too much watching of Animal Planet)
A reworked Kings Quest or Gabriel Knight could have seriously awesome potential in this time and age, imagine a dark comedy version of Gabriel Knight or a huge scaled world in King Quest using todays graphic engines. Although, these titles could also go the way Atari has gone and taken a well remembered franchise and made mud of its great name (*cough* Alone in the Dark).
Unfortunately, we’ll probably never know the distance an old franchise could go in this new world. We’ll have to pull out an old copy of our prized posessions and remember just how great they once where.
Left for Dead was by far my favorite game from the 2000’s. Never gets old.
I’d have to say that Elder Scrolls: Oblivion is my favorite game from the 2000’s as it was such a beautiful game at that time and it had such charm with everything from the soundtrack to the NPC’s. It was a wonderful game.
@EA not green-lighting any single player games: In my opinion, I would rather have a grander single-player experience rather than a tacked-on multiplayer with little substance. I like to go from one game to another, and multiplayer doesn’t do much for me if it isn’t the main focus of the game (ex. Team Fortress 2).
@Wii U: I am quite excited for this and I will definitely be saving up the money to buy the Premium Edition and a ton of games next summer. Also I really love the fact that it will not only have an HDMI cable included, but also a charger for the Gamepad. That way I won’t have to buy any additional items or accessories which would all add up to a higher price than what is shown on the box.
The 32GB of storage doesn’t bother me because I barely buy anything digitally so I don’t really need the space.
List of games that I would like to play on the Wii U:
-Bayonetta 2
-Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two
-Game & Wario
-New Super Mario Bros. U
-Pikmin 3
-Rayman Legends
-ZombiU
-BIT.TRIP Presents Runner 2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien
-Trine 2: Director’s Cut