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Failed Games That Damaged Or Killed Their Companies

Posted by Soulskill on from the cause-or-symptom dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Develop has an excellent piece up profiling a bunch of average to awful titles that flopped so hard they harmed or sunk their studio or publisher. The list includes Haze, Enter The Matrix, Hellgate: London, Daikatana, Tabula Rasa, and — of course — Duke Nukem Forever. 'Daikatana was finally released in June 2000, over two and a half years late. Gamers weren't convinced the wait was worth it. A buggy game with sidekicks (touted as an innovation) who more often caused you hindrance than helped ... achieved an average rating of 53. By this time, Eidos is believed to have invested over $25 million in the studio. And they called it a day. Eidos closed the Dallas Ion Storm office in 2001.'"

4 of 397 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Enter the Matrix was OK... by FinchWorld · · Score: 5, Informative

    Goldeneye N64.

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    "I may be full of crap about this game, and I may be wrong, and that's fine." -Jack Thompson
  2. Infocom by vlm · · Score: 4, Informative

    Infocom made a great series of text adventure games, so they logically moved into the database arena, which sank the company.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infocom

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornerstone_(software)

    --
    "Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
  3. Re:Enter the Matrix was OK... by nebaz · · Score: 4, Informative

    How about the original Star Wars vector graphics arcade game (Death Star run?) I always enjoyed that one.

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    Rhymes that keep their secrets will unfold behind the clouds.There upon the rainbow is the answer to a neverending story
  4. Re:Ten years from now - "WoW killed Blizzard" by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 4, Informative

    Apart from WoW, they've not actually released a game in what, a decade? More?

    Warcraft III released in July 2002. Before that was Diablo II in 2000, and Starcraft in 1998. So up to WoW (which released in 2004), they were pretty consistently hitting a game every two years. Since WoW, it's been five.