Adios to Eidos?

[E.T.]

Sales associate @ gamestop indicated to me Eidos was on the financial wire,"doom 'n gloom" forth comming for the successful maker of Tomb Raiders series, Deus Ex & Thief. Hope not.
If so, may the rights to Thief & Deus Ex will be available for sale to insure continuation of these titles.

[Aku]

<div class=\"smallfont\">If so, may the rights to Thief & Deus Ex will be available for sale to insure continuation of these titles.</div>

If they got sold, my personal preference would be that they got picked up by Gathering of Developers, then hand them over to Illusion to develop. :)

[E.T.]

<div class=\"smallfont\"><div class=\"smallfont\"></div>

If they got sold, my personal preference would be that they got picked up by Gathering of Developers, then hand them over to Illusion to develop. :)</div>

...or to anyone that would keep these games alive. I would hate to see Thief/Deus Ex meet the fragmented, damned to oblivion destiny of System Shock.

[Renzatic Gear]

If they got sold, my personal preference would be that they got picked up by Gathering of Developers, then hand them over to Illusion to develop. :)

Is Gathering of Developers even still around? I haven't seen a game released by them in quite awhile.

[E.T.]

<div class=\"smallfont\">Is Gathering of Developers even still around? I haven't seen a game released by them in quite awhile.</div>


Sure, albiet a low profile currently.....http://www.godgames.com/
Real low profile; Zoo Tycoon!

I was suprised to see H&D2 listed on godgames.com, the original was not published by them [Illusion/Take2?].

[Friend_Bear]

The entire games market is in danger of collapse these days, remember the dark ages during the mid 8 bit era? When the market again nearly died completely? Most of you might not know about that, but during the mid to late 80s, many software houses were dying and the entire market was suffering, and nearly went the way of the dodo.

Fortuntely, things soon picked up and hasn't looked back since......until now, things have come turn-a-bout and the entire future of the market isn't looking to rosy. In the near future I can see the entire software market being run by just a few big name companys producing games, bleak future huh? Something needs to be done, and done soon......just don't tell me what, cuz I don't know.

If Eidos go, then that will be another major blow to the software industry and might have a knock-on effect making other big name companies think twice. Eidos will not be the first big name to die either, anyone remember a certain company called Westwood? hmm? They were only responsible for games like Command and Conquer and Red Alert (insert sarcasm:p)

What happened to Codemasters? What happened to Activision? What happened to Delphine? What happened to 3DO? Some of these might just been keeping low profiles or have games in production, but some of them definately bit the dust.

[Renzatic Gear]

The entire games market is in danger of collapse these days, remember the dark ages during the mid 8 bit era? When the market again nearly died completely? Most of you might not know about that, but during the mid to late 80s, many software houses were dying and the entire market was suffering, and nearly went the way of the dodo.

Fortuntely, things soon picked up and hasn't looked back since......until now, things have come turn-a-bout and the entire future of the market isn't looking to rosy. In the near future I can see the entire software market being run by just a few big name companys producing games, bleak future huh? Something needs to be done, and done soon......just don't tell me what, cuz I don't know.

If Eidos go, then that will be another major blow to the software industry and might have a knock-on effect making other big name companies think twice. Eidos will not be the first big name to die either, anyone remember a certain company called Westwood? hmm? They were only responsible for games like Command and Conquer and Red Alert (insert sarcasm:p)

What happened to Codemasters? What happened to Activision? What happened to Delphine? What happened to 3DO? Some of these might just been keeping low profiles or have games in production, but some of them definately bit the dust.

There's a HUGE difference between what happened during the 80's and what's happening now. Back then there was no demand, people just played it then dropped it like a bad habit. Now, though, there's a HUGE amount of demand..it's a huge industry that rivals the movie business, but you have alot of stupid companies making stupid mistakes and it's costing them their ass in the end. Eidos probably poured tons of money into hyping Tomb Raider, a series that people got burnt out on by the 3rd game and were quite sick of. They probably expected sales that would rival the first 2 games (the only good games in the entire series) and took a huge risk...and...well...no one bought it.

And comeon..I can't believe you're smacking poor ole Westwood around like that. They were responsible for some GREAT games back before they were bought out by EA and turned into a C&C factory.

[Friend_Bear]

Demand today is dropping like a stone though, people are a lot wiser these days, people don't want to spend good hard earned cash on half finished, buggy or just plain sucky products and a ton of total trash is released every week or so, just to bring in extra funds whilst the various companys try to hit the big one, Eidos hit big with the Tomb Raider series but milked it to death and didn't quit while they were ahead! Todays software industry requires having a good marketable product and the brains to back it up, Greed obviously clouded some of the higher-ups judgement and everyone is paying for it, especially us lowly Amateur/Pro gamers who have respected Eidos over the years.

The movie industry though has many, many advantages over the Video Game industry though, such as the long runs in the Cinema, the video sales, the royalties, the merchandise etc.....Granted they cost a lot more to make, but they make far much more money after the intial release, Video Games don't have that luxury, the only reason the video game industry rivals the movies is that home consoles have become the norm and easily accessable, you can thank Nintendo and Atari for that but they just don't have the flexibility the movies do.

And tell me some good games that westwood produced that wasn't part of the C&C series? In fact, actually I only liked the original C&C and Red Alert, I never liked Tib Sun that much and I didn't like Red Alert 2 that much either, and Generals was funded by EA. Westwood were resonsibly for the Lands of Lore series which were pretty dire really. They made the early dune series, but they only served as a framework for the original C&C even though they were pretty good for the time,. Don't get me wrong though, Westwood "were" a very good company.

What it really boils down to these days is that if you make a crappy game, its going to get pirated/cracked very easily so even more possiblee revenue is lost, people will not buy a crappy - over hyped product - highly bugged (feel free to insert more here lol) game, and if people don't buy the game, the company don't make money, and the company goes out of business/taken over, and we all lose then. Maybe we need some good big brand names to die in order to make the surviving ones thing twice before we lose everything like we very nearly did back in the 80s.

[databug]

Sales associate @ gamestop indicated to me Eidos was on the financial wire,"doom 'n gloom" forth comming for the successful maker of Tomb Raiders series, Deus Ex & Thief. Hope not.
If so, may the rights to Thief & Deus Ex will be available for sale to insure continuation of these titles.


Hey guys...
I don't trust what a gamestop moron says to me - I've been to 7 different stores for gamestop in Texas here, and they each have their own tales of woe (usually they get it from their own company magazine). Like the time a gamestop guy told me way back, that RETURN TO CASTLE WOLFENSTEIN was just a rumor (laugh). I told him, the trailers for it AND a demo are on the net already. He said nah, that's just a gimmick. Complete moron.

Anyhow, Eidos MAY go under, in this economy... sure. Anything is possible right now. But I don't see it happening, not for a while perhaps. Eidos still is making money off HITMAN and HITMAN 2. And now, a HITMAN 3 is coming. Thief 1 and 2 were great, but LOOKING GLASS STUDIOS went under, and I forgot the new company who took up THIEF 3 project, but a Thief 3 is on the way this summer 2004.

I'm sorry, but Deus Ex 2 didnt impress me a bit. I played a laggy, buggy demo. I liked the CG rendered looking objects and the great use of shadows - and the weird hologram hot chicks dancing in some bar haha. Otherwise, JC Denton wasn't the main character again... and the game ran badly (it was a demo ya know, i hear the retail version has people beggin for more patches as we speak). Deus Ex 2 may run great and look great on big-boy machines, but not everyone has those kind of machines ya know. Kind of unfair for a company to screw itself on one of the biggest sequels of the year.

I'm scared to see the spec requirements of DOOM 3 and Half Life 2 haha. John Carmack states Doom 3 will be playable on a 700mhz machine? Uh, yah... at 640x480, 16bit color, all details off, and get 15-20 fps if you're lucky haha. There's just no games I'm excited about... cept a Doom 3 demo, Hitman 3 demo (i always get demos now to see if it'll run on my system good). Last BIG games I played that were flawless, were SIMPSONS HIT AND RUN and GTA VICE CITY. Vice City ran like a dream! GTA 3 ran like crap - I guess when you port a PS2 game to PC, it loses something. Rockstar Games optimized GTA Vice City for pc, and it shows.

Anyhow, that's my 2 cents. I wish MONOLITH or someone would do BLOOD 3, and Interplay would do a 3d version of REDNECK RAMPAGE. When this many cruddy games come out? Revamp the old ones, lordy... I'm sick of seeing Star Wars games and Unreal 2004 spin offs and WW2 games and diablo2-wannabe RPG games and everything.

[mrmaskedrider]

If Eidos goes under, they have only themselves to blame.

Deus Ex was a big hit for them. Deus Ex 2 should have been, and it wasn't, and we all know why. They took a game that was a success on PC and watered it down so much (so they could port it to the game consoles) that it wasn't Deus Ex any more. The result of idiot bean counters in game companies trying to get clever.

I can just about predict what they said when they were planning DE2: "Hey, this time, we'll make the game simple so it can be ported to the consoles! That increases our market by 150%! That means we'll make a lot more money!" What the idiotic tards didn't take into account was when you totally change a game and no one likes it, any brand awareness it had is useless, and nobody wants it in ANY of the markets. Any bet that it's going to succeed goes right out the window, and in the case of DE2, almost every fan I've heard about hated it.

Notice that it's never really good game companies that crap out. Westwood is about the best I've ever seen fail, and they were responsible for 1) Crappy Lands of Lore (gag), 2) That unbearably crappy MMORPG in space that was so bad I can't remember the name of it. In Westwood's case, they spent a lot of money to try and branch out into other genres, but they just weren't good at anything except C&C.

Blizzard? Good company, succeeding. Eidos? Crappy remakes (Hitman 3 has the same engine as 1 and 2), emasculated DE, failing.

So, one of these days these game companies will get smart. But it's survival of the fittest out there. The crappy ones die, that's the way it ought to be. Other companies will always come along to make a great game and succeed.

[databug]

Demand today is dropping like a stone though, people are a lot wiser these days, people don't want to spend good hard earned cash on half finished, buggy or just plain sucky products and a ton of total trash is released every week or so, just to bring in extra funds whilst the various companys try to hit the big one, Eidos hit big with the Tomb Raider series but milked it to death and didn't quit while they were ahead! Todays software industry requires having a good marketable product and the brains to back it up, Greed obviously clouded some of the higher-ups judgement and everyone is paying for it, especially us lowly Amateur/Pro gamers who have respected Eidos over the years.

The movie industry though has many, many advantages over the Video Game industry though, such as the long runs in the Cinema, the video sales, the royalties, the merchandise etc.....Granted they cost a lot more to make, but they make far much more money after the intial release, Video Games don't have that luxury, the only reason the video game industry rivals the movies is that home consoles have become the norm and easily accessable, you can thank Nintendo and Atari for that but they just don't have the flexibility the movies do.

And tell me some good games that westwood produced that wasn't part of the C&C series? In fact, actually I only liked the original C&C and Red Alert, I never liked Tib Sun that much and I didn't like Red Alert 2 that much either, and Generals was funded by EA. Westwood were resonsibly for the Lands of Lore series which were pretty dire really. They made the early dune series, but they only served as a framework for the original C&C even though they were pretty good for the time,. Don't get me wrong though, Westwood "were" a very good company.

What it really boils down to these days is that if you make a crappy game, its going to get pirated/cracked very easily so even more possiblee revenue is lost, people will not buy a crappy - over hyped product - highly bugged (feel free to insert more here lol) game, and if people don't buy the game, the company don't make money, and the company goes out of business/taken over, and we all lose then. Maybe we need some good big brand names to die in order to make the surviving ones thing twice before we lose everything like we very nearly did back in the 80s.

Mmmm I agree with bear AND renzatic both. As far as the 80s go, I was 12 back in 1985. Nintendo is the one responsible for bringing video games back from the brink of extinction. Now, Nintendo is barely holding on it seems, with their kiddy-games that came out for the N64 and now the Gamecube.

Now, reznatic, if I spelled it right, IS correct..... the video game biz makes WAY more than the movie biz, by far. Movie houses cannot compete. Many games are being turned into movies lately, and more on the way (and they end up being crappy), because frankly? Hollywood is out of ideas :rolleyes: The recent AvP movie, which I haven't seen, is being reported by my friends, and many reviews online, as being just a horrid movie, for example. Ya know, the last 2 movies I saw in the theater, were T2 and Indiana Jones and the last crusade, seriously :eek: Nothing good out to me lately, and this applies to video gaming, too.

Too much focus is being put on console games now. Sure, console games are growing up and basically PC quality now, graphically anyhow. I tried a console lately, and hated it, I couldn't work at FPS game with an analog stick, it was tedious, awkward and slow. I prefer mouse and keyboard by far. I kind of agree with bear, in the fact that pc gaming seems to be in trouble. But, when games like DOOM 3 come around, and basically force many of us to upgrade our systems? Well, hardware manufacturers cash in, too. I see pc games holding on steadily, but I don't see many decent games on the horizon to be honest. I think almost every idea for a game has been done. I wish there would have been a BLOOD 3. But that's just me in lala land I guess. I wish someone would take up where dead Xatrix left off, and made an actual 3D version of Redneck Rampage, too.

I do agree about buggy games and half finished. Deus Ex 2 flopped, Thief 3 sort of tried new things and it sorta flopped. Duke Nukem Forever? Ok, we've been waiting 'forever' for it. 3DRealm's whole attitude of "when it's finished" may land their butts in the poor house, ya know? Also, while I'm ranting here at work and typing random thoughts... what's with all the pay-for-play RPG games lately? I'm not going to buy a game for $50 then pay another 20 or 30 a month to play it online. Recall THE SIMS ONLINE hmm? I got to witness a few friends play that disaster online, and the other people in the game were rude, and already formed sort of like 'gangs' or clans LOL. People were clanish, like in Diablo 2 for example. Just rude. Heck, and for Xbox lovers out there, I've watched my buddies play it online and use the headset feature. Nothing but kids, I mean... game after game after server after server, the oldest person sounded 12. So for reasons along these line, which have affected pc games online as well, I quit playing games online totally. All you hear is "he has a wall hack!" or you get banned from the server because some 20 year old kid tried to boss around the older gamers, and the older guys wouldn't have that LOL.

Ok back on topic.. I'm ranting. Anyhow, I agree... not a lot of good pc games come out lately, and games coming out like HL2 and Doom3, that demand you to totally almost build a new system, are ridiculous. Ok I'm guilty.. I built a new system last week LOL. But not for Doom 3 or HL2, hell no. HELL no, I did it because I want to play more games than those 2! But lately, even some good games you find on the shelves, are indeed buggy, half finished, etc. Bad performance. Example? Hitman Contracts. Turning on the "post filter" effect in the game slugs it down, and I now am the proud owner of a P4 3ghz machine, 512mb pc3200 ram, and a GF FX 5700. Of course the ram needs to be upped to a gig, and I need a 6800 Ultra probably, my system is still a goodie and bangs through games easily now. But the new Hitman game, with post filtering on? CRAWLS, and I have to turn the effect off. Sure, the effect is great, but why does it crawl?! It does this in Thief 3 with "bloom" effect and also in Deus Ex 2. Just not optimized... that's my big complaint guys. Games are coming out on pc, and ya have to have a system so high-end, it's retarded.

I blame high requirements for games like Far Cry, on non-optimization. So I see where bear is coming from, and the other guy. Shoot, sometimes I MISS playing TFC and Day of Defeat. Bad graphics by today's standards or not, it was fun. Today? Great graphics, lighting, shadows... bad performance, bugs.. etc. Hell I've turned to BUDGET games lately and some of those are better quality games, play-wise, than some of the big name games out there, as nutty as that sounds.

Sorry to rant and go off topic heh. By the way, anyone believe The Sims 2 will REALLY run on a 700mhz system? And why did Carmack say Doom3 would run on a 700mhz system and he touted the Radeon 9700, but th GF 6800 ultra runs it the best after the game was actually released?!