Gone But Not Forgotten Video Game Developers/Publishers Lost 2000-2017 - Cavedog Entertainment
Gone But Not
Forgotten Video Game Developers/Publishers Lost 2000-2017
Cavedog Entertainment
was a game development studio based in Bothell, Washington, the studio was
created by parent company Humongous Entertainment in 1996, the studio was
headed up by former Lucas Arts designer, programmer, and producer due of Ron
Gilbert and Shelley Day, Gilbert who had previously worked on Maniac Mansion
and the first two Monkey Island games while Day had previous experience with Electronic
Arts. Day also worked for Accolade, Taito. Also joining Gilbert and Day at
Cavedog was Chris Taylor who would go on to found Gas Powered Games a couple of
years later.
The same year that
Cavedog were founded its parent company Humongous Entertainment was purchased
by GT Interactive which would later become Infogrames in 1999 and eventually
Atari. In the same year Squaresoft closed down its Redmond offices many of the
ex Squaresoft employees would move over to Cavedog and two years later the
studios first game Total Annihilation was announced and shown that E3 in
Atlanta in 1997 a game that would go on to receive many accolades including
many game of year awards.
Total Annihilation was critically well received real time strategy game
Game creator Chris
Taylor would leave the company shortly before the release of the games first
expansion Total Annihilation: Core Contingency in spite of the loss of Taylor,
Cavedog would go on to release a second expansion for the game called Total
Annihilation: Battle Tactics as well as releasing many free downloadable
enhancements and patches and help develop a strong community around the game.
In 1999 Cavedog
released the second game in the Total Annihilation series however major
missteps occurred with the developers shifting for the Sci-Fi themes of the
first game and opting for a more fantasy based game this as you would expect
did not go over well with fans of the first game in the series and critics were
not kind to the game either with the game rating 15.3pts lower on my own rating
scale.
Cavedog
Entertainments closure came at the close of the millennium in a time when the
games industry began to see a downturn in sales especially the developers
parent company GT Interactive which was a real shame, at the time Cavedog had
the Total Annihilation series they were working on three new projects at the
time of the studio being closed, Amen: The Awakening, a first-person shooter;
Elysium, a fantasy adventure title, and Good & Evil, the latter was being
produced by Ron Gilbert, however all three were discontinued in late 1999 with
Humongous Games purchased by Infogrames shortly after with Cavedog being
discarded and filing for bankruptcy in 2000.
Elysium is a cancelled fantasy adventure game from Cavedog
Amen: The Awakening was a cancelled first person shooter
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