Shifting business models to blame
Blitz Games Studios is to wind down and close its 1UP initiative, which helped small studios develop, distribute, and promote their games.
EuroGamer - It started, as most things do, on an internet forum.
Specifically, on Blitz's internal office forum. If you didn't work at Blitz that was, you probably never sampled its joy. A brilliantly off topic scramble of weird links to cute animal pictures and competitively priced secondhand games.
Blitz Games Studios, a major video games maker based in Leamington Spa, has shut down.
The firm had been creating games for 23 years, and employed 175 people - 50 of which will be kept on to work on current unfinished projects.
Company co-founder Philip Oliver said the business was unsustainable and had been struggling for several years.
"Nobody is angry," he told the BBC, "everybody's just very sad. We have tried everything."
Blitz is known for many popular titles, including high profile tie-ins such as Shrek, Spongebob Squarepants and Mickey Mouse.
To hell with the terrible games they made. I hope the guys (and girls) that worked at Blitz can find employment and get back on their feet. It must be a terrible time for them.
Best of luck.
UK can really use tax breaks if it wants to have success with game developers.
without it, they will have a hard time surviving.
They've been trying to give the studios the tax break, EU turned the proposals down... (Apparently our government now need permission to allow tax breaks within their own country.....)
It's a shame, but Blitz's business model was 100% client-based work. They built licensed games for third parties, like SpongeBob etc.
They had no IPs of their own, no fall back. And right now, before a console transition is the least likely time you're going to land a client - licensors see too much risk involved.
EuroGamer: "Blitz co-founder Philip Oliver's first interview since the demise of one of the UK's longest-running developers."
