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News from Thursday, November 19, 2009

Battlefront developer ceases to be
Posted by Jason | Comments: 6

Pandemic Studios, who developed Battlefront, Battlefront II, Mercenaries and Clone Wars (2002) for LEC before being absorbed along with Bioware by EA has been shut down:

Electronic Arts has confirmed rumours regarding the closure of Mercenaries and Saboteur developer Pandemic Studios.

The majority of the Los Angeles-based studio’s 200 staff have been let go, including founders Josh Resnick, Andrew Goldman and Greg Borrud, who served as president, CEO and vice president of product development respectively, the publisher told Joystiq.

This makes for a sucky situation for all those developers, and a fuzzy situation as far as who is developing the elusive Battlefront III. In 2006, the game's development was associated with UK studio Free Radical Design before it too closed its doors.

Following that, the game was said to be transferred to the hands of Rebellion, developer of the two handheld entries in the series, Renegade Squadron and, earlier this month, Elite Squadron. It was later suggested though that the company was only working on a PS2 port of the game, and that the franchise's original developer Pandemic was back at the wheel. That Pandemic would have been developing for LEC despite being owned by EA isn't out of the question given that LEC is partnering with Bioware for The Old Republic.

Of course, that's all moot now. I wonder who's next on the list?

Post a new Comment | Comments for this news post:

Comment by: Melancholick \| Posted Friday, November 20, 2009
I'm still sore and sour over the death of Free Radical, especially after seeing what they had planned for SW: BFIII. This sort of soothes the latent agitation, albiet in a really sadistic way. Heh. Hehheh.
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Comment by: The Tingler \| Posted Saturday, November 21, 2009
I am too with Free Radical. Haze was a major cock-up on every level, but they were an extremely talented developer.
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Comment by: Melancholick \| Posted Saturday, November 21, 2009
Oh, man. I think I made a conscious effort to block Haze from my memory. It was a rental, but the constant head-check of "THESE were the guys who made my beloved Timesplitters?!" endured through the entire few days that I had it. Just a waste. A total waste. But hey, we'll always have this: http://kotaku.com/5132905/heres-star-wars-battlefront-iiis-sith-kenobi
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Comment by: ocki \| Posted Friday, November 20, 2009
R.I.P.
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Comment by: The Tingler \| Posted Thursday, November 19, 2009
Seems a bit of a hot potato, that Battlefront III! Two developers started on it and died! Unfortunately, this is the inevitable downside of being publisher-owned. It may look good at the start, give you a bit more security, but the moment things start going iffy with the publisher they'll cut your staff, and if things go iffy with even one of your games, they'll close you down.
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Comment by: clone2727 \| Posted Thursday, November 19, 2009
They cut some of the Maxis team too! Egad!
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