For as big of an industry as video gaming is and has been for decades now, it’s still a somewhat fickle and unsteady business on the developer level. Developers can have huge success for years, yet can still find themselves only one flop and/or acquisition away from going out of business. A relatively small number of game studios operating today probably don’t feel like they are on thin ice and are only a couple of creative or commercial missteps away from being shuttered.
In fact, on the list of video game developers that have been forced to shut down, many are responsible for some of the best-selling, most highly-acclaimed, and most important games of all time. As you’ll see on this list, some had so many pantheon-level games on their resumes that it’s hard to understand why their indefinite future in the business wasn’t guaranteed. Unfortunately, business doesn’t always care about how much great stuff you’ve done, and the moment you stop being a cash cow, you’re in danger of being put out to pasture.
10 Neversoft Entertainment
There’s no disputing what Neversoft’s most popular game franchise was: Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater and its various spin-offs. In fact, when you look at when the Tony Hawk games stopped being good, it’s when Neversoft stopped working on them. Sadly, Neversoft had to spend its final years cranking out Guitar Hero sequels, but before that, they had not only redefined the action sports genre but released the amazing Spider-Man for PS1 as well as the underrated pre-Red Dead Redemption open world western epic Gun.
9 Black Isle Studios
Although many of the key people behind Black Isle went on to form Obsidian, a developer that has done great stuff and carried on the Black Isle legacy in many ways, the original studio is still greatly missed. After all, this is the company that did the original two Fallout games, not to mention Planescape: Torment and Icewind Dale. As a publisher, they also helped a little series called Baldur’s Gate redefine the RPG genre.
8 LucasArts
“LucasArts” might technically still exist, but its function is strictly to license games for Disney. Before Disney acquired LucasArts the company was once a dedicated developer, and was responsible for some of the most acclaimed and pioneering adventure games of the ’90s.
Maniac Mansion, Monkey Island, Grim Fandango, Day of the Tentacle, and Sam & Max were all originally developed by LucasArts, to say nothing of the fact that they were responsible for the best Indiana Jones game of all time: Fate of Atlantis.
7 Core Design
Core Design is now perhaps most well-known as the developer that ran Tomb Raider into the ground, but that isn’t fair as they are also the developer that created the series – and Lara Croft herself – to begin with. The issues was that publisher Eidos demanded Core Design crank out new Tomb Raiders every year which gave the developer a bad reputation. Before finding success with the treasure hunter and her spelunking adventures, Core was responsible for early cult classics like Rick Dangerous, Chuck Rock, and even a 1990 Monty Python game.
6 Bizarre Creations
EA and Activision both have a reputation for acquiring beloved and successful developers and then shuttering them shortly thereafter, presumably so they can distribute the employees across the teams that make each of the publishers’ biggest franchises. It’s a really infuriating trend, especially when it happens to a developer like Bizarre Creations, who created some of the best racing games of all time with its Project Gotham franchise, not to mention early digital hit Geometry Wars and the criminally overlooked 2010 combat racing title Blur.
5 Westwood Studios
Westwood Studios, founded in 1985, created the Command & Conquer series. Need we say more? Because we certainly can, as Westwood also developed the Eye of the Beholder games, Dune II, 1997’s Blade Runner, among many others. Along with Blizzard and another developer we’ll be getting to later, Westwood is one of the pioneers of the entire strategy genre and didn’t deserve to be shut down after just a couple of lean financial years.
4 Pandemic Studios
Formed by industry vets who were responsible for games like Battlezone and Dark Reign, Pandemic spent a couple of years working on sequels to existing franchises before releasing Full Spectum Warrior, its first original IP.
Soon after, the studio shook off its RTS roots by venturing into open-world action with Destroy All Humans!, a genre it would cultivate into acclaimed titles like Star Wars: Battlefront and Mercenaries: Playground of Destruction. Pandemic was bought out by EA in 2008, and closed the following year.
3 Ensemble Studios
Here’s that other strategy game pioneer we hinted at in the Westwood Studios entry. Ensemble Studios’s contributions to the then-fledgling genre was the Age of Empires series, as well as the well-received Halo RTS spin-off Halo Wars. The latter game would prove to be the company’s last endeavor, despite positive critical praise and sales high enough to warrant a sequel. It is said that Ensemble had as many as six games in various phases of development when they were shut down, including Titan, a supposed Halo-based MMO.
2 Origin Systems
Besides being founded by Richard “Lord British” Garriot of Ultima fame, Origin Systems saw many of gaming’s bggest names on its staff role during its 21-year history, including John Romero (Doom), Warren Spector (Deus Ex), and Tom Chilton (World of Warcraft). As for Origin itself, besides being responsible for almost the entire Ultima franchise – including the groundbreaking Ultima Online – the studio also created the legendary Wing Commander series.
1 Midway
Can you imagine Namco going bankrupt, or Capcom shutting down, or Konami selling off all its assets? That was what a huge deal it was when Midway Games had to close in 2010 after spending over 30 years as one of the biggest developers and publishers in the entire gaming industry. In addition to all the stuff they put out as publishers, the list of games Midway themselves developed or co-developed is too long to list here, but the highlights include Mortal Kombat, NBA Jam, Rampage, Paperboy, Cruis’n USA, and Gauntlet, which only scratches the surface of the dozens of classics Midway is responsible for.
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