THQ Dissolved

95 points by wonginator1221 13 years ago | 53 comments

csmattryder 13 years ago |

Shame, they were one of the only publishers willing to take the risk on a new IP.

Which other publisher would dare take on the offensive, lewd sandbox game like Saint's Row, each sequel just a little more over the top than the last?

In a market full of repetitive sequels, played out plotlines, and annual cash-cows, I'm hoping Koch Media do Volition and Saint's Row 4 justice!

sliverstorm 13 years ago | |

Shame, they were one of the only publishers willing to take the risk on a new IP.

Sadly, the worst part is not that an adventuresome publisher is no longer with us. The worst part is that all the other publishers will now be that much more afraid of being adventuresome.

doktrin 13 years ago | |

The success of saints row exemplifies not only willingness to take on risk, but the importance and value of iteration towards success.

Saints row 1 was largely forgettable, 2 became interesting, and 3 is a sandbox classic, out shining in many ways even GTA IV. The combination of novel ideas and willingness to improve and change is such a crucial combination when developing a product.

officemonkey 13 years ago | | |

The more I play Saints Row 3, the more I'm convinced it's the finest Sandbox game since GTA: San Andreas.

bunderbunder 13 years ago | |

I suspect that Saint's Row is most notable for how exceptional it is compared to the rest of THQ's line-up. Not being an Xbox owner, I can't say I've played it, but I'll accept for the sake of argument that it is a truly original game and not just a well-made GTA look-alike.

So even given that, to me the main thing THQ's name brings to mind is the endless stream of games they churned out under licensing agreements with various TV and movie franchises. If I were going to pick a game company to be the poster child for unoriginal cash cows, the maker of all those SpongeBob, Kung Fu Panda and WWF games would absolutely be a top candidate.

yareally 13 years ago | | |

Saints Row 3 is also on PC. You can find it cheap during one of the seasonal Steam sales (under 10 dollars recently). Does not take a mega PC to run it either in requirements. If you only roll with Linux or OSX, it's old enough it should run fine with Wine.

yareally 13 years ago | |

Thankfully EA, Activision or one of the other more cookie cutter publishers did not get ahold of Saints Row and Metro. If they did, each series might as well have died with THQ. I think I would be sick to see Metro or Saints Row turned into a Call of Duty or Medal of Honor knockoff.

EA just is not what it used to be and all my favorite classic franchises (Command and Conquer, C&C Red Alert, Sim City, Syndicate, etc) are just a shadow of what they once were.

cageface 13 years ago | | |

You might find it amusing that I considered all those to be from a much less interesting iteration of EA than the one I grew up with, which really did make some classic games:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.U.L.E.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archon:_The_Light_and_the_Dark

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

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Seven_Cities_of_Gold_(video...

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

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

ekianjo 13 years ago | | |

> EA just is not what it used to be and all my favorite classic franchises (Command and Conquer, C&C Red Alert, Sim City, Syndicate, etc) are just a shadow of what they once were.

The games you quoted were not FROM EA per se, they were mostly from studios acquired by EA which were dissolved soon after they released something worthy of publishing. Sim City was from Maxix, SYndicate from Bullfrog, CC from Westwood. Do not assume developer=publisher.

amishforkfight 13 years ago |

As someone whose employer just underwent Chapter 11 and a subsequent sale, I hope that the power-jousting, cockfights, backstabbing, and general dumbassery that I experienced will not happen to the members of THQ. The lengths some people will go through for some token of power...

minimaxir 13 years ago | |

Ironically, you just described the gameplay of THQ-published Saint's Row 3.

kesun421 13 years ago |

With Sega's purchase of Relic, hopefully they can pick up the Homeworld franchise and do something with it again!

Tiktaalik 13 years ago | |

Sega actually just purchased Relic and the Company of Heroes IP. Homeworld, and other legacy IPs, are to be sold later. http://neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=509695

afterburner 13 years ago | |

Yes, or continue Dawn of War (maybe even go back to the first installment's RTS approach?)

jcurbo 13 years ago | |

I'm actually quite pleased with that, Sega seems like a good home for Relic. They seem to do ok with The Creative Assembly (Total War games). Homeworld 3 please :)

ekianjo 13 years ago | | |

Was Homeworld 2 any good, by the way ?

jfoutz 13 years ago | |

"Crytek, who is currently developing Homefront 2, has purchased the rights to the Homefront franchise."

later on, they revealed it was $500,000

Jaecen 13 years ago | | |

OP was regarding Homeworld, not Homefront.

mikelat 13 years ago |

I wish you had posted a better source of gaming journalism, I don't like IGN at all.

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/01/23/fin-thq-sells-off...

venomsnake 13 years ago |

Metro and CoH 2 seems to be safe. Southpark may be in trouble, and Obsidian are in no need of additional trouble right now. And Ubisoft don't know what an RPG is.

Darksiders are done which is sad.

chris11 13 years ago | |

Ubisoft wants to buy South Park, but it looks like there may be legal trouble. South Park Studios filed a complaint saying that THQ did not have the legal right to sell South Park as long as South Park Studios reclaims the license by paying the full amount that THQ put into the game.

http://www.digitalspy.com/gaming/news/a453020/south-park-stu...

venomsnake 13 years ago | | |

I think that Ubisoft is a death sentence for any creative studio, and obsidian is that. I thought with the 2004-5-6 Prince of Persia trilogy and Beyond good and Evil that Ubisoft has finally found out how to make great games that are also creative.

But from all of their recent years - they ran Heroes into the ground, from the fabled AC franchise only the ACII is really good, and whatever they ship they manage to make unplayable with the uplay crap.

Apocryphon 13 years ago | | |

I hope whomever South Park Studios does bequeath the rights to the game to will treat it nicely. Poor Obsidian, even when they find a publisher who doesn't seem like it will abuse them, the publisher goes under. Perhaps their only friend are the fans, thanks be to Kickstarter.

yareally 13 years ago |

Metro 2033 is most likely in good hands. The parent company that bought them owns Deep Silver, who published one of the great games of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series[1], which I think Metro pulls from. Random fun fact, but the first S.T.A.L.K.E.R. game was also published by THQ. Probably why THQ were so interested in Metro 2033, which came shortly after.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S.T.A.L.K.E.R._%28series%29

lloeki 13 years ago | |

> which I think Metro pulls from

Metro 2033 is adapted from a russian '05 novel of the same name, while S.T.A.L.K.E.R is from both the '72 novel Stalker and its '79 movie.

They bear no lineage.

AimHere 13 years ago | | |

Partly to help people find it in their bookshops, but mostly because I'm an anal-retentive pedant, the novel is actually called 'Roadside Picnic' by the Strugatsky brothers.

yareally 13 years ago | | |

Thanks! I did not know it was a separate novel as well for Metro.

snowmiser 13 years ago |

I hate how people echo Saints Row and Company of Heroes whenever someone mentions THQ. Darksiders and Darksiders 2 (especially the latter) are brilliant games.

runevault 13 years ago | |

Vigil is the part of this that most interests me, and saddens in me in that the current word last I knew was no one had shown much interest in picking the studio up.

TruthElixirX 13 years ago | |

I loved DSI. I hate DSII.

dpiers 13 years ago |

My first programming gig was an internship at Vigil Games when I was 20. I had an awesome summer there and worked with some amazing people; hopefully those who were still at the studio will find something soon.

angersock 13 years ago |

Can somebody leak the source code for the old Red Faction games?

Those didn't seem to be a franchise that got sold off, so maybe is abandonware?

jcurbo 13 years ago | |

My bet is that Red Faction comes along with Volition.

jcurbo 13 years ago | | |

Or maybe not, if it's the same case as Homeworld: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5106540

newman314 13 years ago |

I hope Homefront 2 ends up being good. Homefront is a ton of fun to play.

jgoney 13 years ago | |

Exactly this! They can essentially start the story for Homefront 2 right where the first one stopped, and with Crytek's track record, it should look amazing as well.

That is, if it's not already deep in development, which I think I remember hearing that it is.

newman314 13 years ago | | |

They need to balance the guns somewhat, fix the spawn points and get people playing the DLC maps but otherwise multiplayer is fantastic.

The ability to get additional toys per round is a huge mechanic IMO in replayability.

I also look forward to the improved graphics that Crytek will bring. My only fear is that Crysis from what I have seen feels pretty cold at times so hopefully that does not bleed over.

EDIT: I also don't get why Homefront was so panned by critics. The graphics obviously pale when compared to something like Crysis but like I said, I think they got many aspects of multiplayer very right.

hef19898 13 years ago | | |

On the grafics part I completly agree with you, crytek games DO look great. Even if they botched it up somewhat with Crysis 2 at the beginning.

Where they have to improve upon actually is the story and gameplay, Crysis 2 was a little disapointing there, I think. Crysis Warhead on th other hand was way better.

zobzu 13 years ago |

So long THQ.

I hope SEGA will make good use of my favorite games.