Industry Research

Bungie Studios

Currently based in Kirkland, Washington.

Key Personnel: Harold Ryan (President), Jason Jones(CCO), Matin O'Donnell(Composer) & Joseph Staten(Writer).

Main Website = www. bungie.net

Bungie a video games company was responsible for producing various game titles such as the Marathon series, Myth series, Oni and most famously the Halo series. Bungie began as a small games company and was founded in May 1991 by Alex Seropian and Jason Jones. They were responsible for several small titles for both the PC and Mac platforms.

In 1999, however, their fame was about to change as they unveiled their new project, Halo, which they announced would be a first-person action game for both Windows and Macintosh. On June 19,2000, soon after Halo's preview at Electronic Entertainment Expo 2000, Microsoft announced that it had acquired Bungie Software and that Bungie would become a part of the Microsoft Game Division under the same name Bungie Studios. Halo would be developed exclusively for the Xbox console which was also owned by Microsoft. During the time this partnership seemed logical and somewhat enabled Bungie Studios to step out into the limelight. The reasons for Bungie accepting Microsoft's offer were varied. Jones stated that the merge was "all a blur." He explained that this opportunity to work with Xbox and a company which took its games seriously was far too valuable to reject. Even before publishing Marathon, Bungie had apparently had a serious offer from Activision. The stability and growing popularity of the Xbox console was a major factor for Bungie's choice to merge with Microsoft, but there was also another reason. During that time it was discovered that certain Asian Versions of Myth II in some cases could erase the player's entire hard drive of memory. This consequently gave rise to a massive recall and withdrawal of a huge number of game copies right before they were shipped which cost Bungie an estimated 1 Million Dollars. Martin O'Donnell explained that this huge recall created some financial uncertainty. It was stated however that accepting this offer from Microsoft was "something that Bungie did not need to do."

Despite all this Halo: Combat Evolved, meanwhile became a critically acclaimed hit, selling more than 6.5 million copies worldwide, and becoming the Xbox'x flagship franchise. It was no secret that many consumers bought an Xbox just to play Halo, this I do know as I was one of them. There was no doubt that Xbox's success was largely to do with the success of Halo.

Halo's success led to Bungie creating two sequels. Halo 2 was released on November 9, 2004 for Xbox, making more than $125 million on release day and setting a record in the entertainment industry. Halo 3, the final installment in the Halo trilogy, was released on September 25, 2007 for Xbox 360 and surpassed Halo 2's records, making $170 million in its first twenty-four hours of release and becoming the most pre-ordered game in history.

On October 1, 2007, a mere six days after the release of Halo 3, Microsoft and Bungie announced that Bungie was splitting from its parent and becoming a privately-held Limited Liability Company named Bungie LLC. As outlined in a deal Microsoft would retain a minority stake and continue to partner with B ungie on publishing and marketing both Halo and future projects, with the Halo intellectual property belonging to Microsoft.

After the split Bungie announced that they would be working on two more Halo projects. Firstly a prequel and expansion to Halo 3 titled Halo 3: ODST which was released on the 22nd of September 2009. The second project will be a prequel to the first Halo game Halo: Combat Evolved titled Halo Reach which is expected to be released sometime in autumn later this year in 2010.

During the success of the Halo Franchise, Bungie's Headquarters has been moved from Chicago to Washington. Particularly after the success of Halo 2 Bungie's staff has also expanded steadily from 120 to 165. There current headquarters is open plan and their culture has remained informal and above all creative. It was predicted that the relationship between Microsoft and Bungie was "doomed to fail" because of the fact that both companies had conflicting views and ideals. This informal attitude was however one of the reasons why Microsoft was interested in Bungie. Although Jordan Weisman stated that Microsoft almost came close to destroying the company's development which is exactly what happened to FASA Studio. It was apparent that many Bungie employees were concerned that Microsoft would eventually have suffocated the company's creative culture had they not separated. Perhaps the success of Halo 3 was a massive boost in confidence to Bungie employees demonstrating that they could now stand on their own two feet. I still feel however that Microsoft was a major factor which made Halo so successful.

Blizzard Entertainment

Headquarters currently based in Irvine, California, USA.

Key Personnel: Michael Morhaime (President and co-founder), Frank Pearce (Vice president and co-founder), Rob Pardo (Vice President), Chris Metzen (Vice President of Creative Development).

Main Website = www.blizzard.com

Blizzard is also a video games company and was founded by Michael Morhaime, Allen Adham and Frank Pearce as Silicon & Synapse in February 1991. In its early days it specialised in creating game ports for other studios. Ports include titles such as J.R.R. Lord of the Rings, Vol.1 and Battle Chess II. In 1993 the company created games such as Rock N' Roll Racing and The Lost Vikings. In 1994, the company briefly changed its name to Chaos Studios, before settling on Blizzard Entertainment after it was discovered that another company with the name Chaos name already existed. That same year, they were acquired by distributor Davidson & Associates for under $10 million. Shortly after this Blizzard shipped their breakthrough hit Warcraft: Orcs & Humans.

Blizzard has changed hands several times since then. Eventually Blizzard was sold to French publisher Havas in 1998. That same year Havas was purchased by Vivendi. Blizzard was part of the Vivendi Games group of Vivendi. In July 2008 Vivendi Games merged with Activision, using Blizzard's name in the resulting company, Activision Blizzard.

In 1996, Blizzard acquired Condor Games, which had been working on the game Diablo for Blizzard at the time. Condor was renamed Blizzard North, and has since developed hit games Diablo, Diablo II, and Diablo II: Lord of Destruction. Blizzard North was located in San Mateo, California; the company originated in Redwood City, California.

In January 1997 Blizzard launched their online gaming service Battle.net with their release of their action-RPG Diablo. In the same year Blizzard also released a military science fiction realtime strategy game titled starcraft which by 2009 has sold more than 11 million copies, it is one of the best selling games for the personal computer. In 2002, Blizzard was able to reacquire rights for three of its earlier Silicon & Synapse titles from Interplay Entertainment and re-release them on Game Boy Advance. In 2004, Blizzard opened European offices in the Paris suberb of Velizy, Yvelines, France, responsible for the European in-game support of World of Warcraft. On November 23rd, 2004, Blizzard released World of Warcraft, its MMORPG. World of Warcraft also known as WoW is a massive multiplayer online role-playing game. It was released on the 10th anniversary of the Warcraft franchise which included titles such as Warcraft I, II & III. World of Warcraft was a massively successful game and has led to two expansions, The Burning Crusade, released on January 16th 2007 and Wrath of the Lich King, released on November 13th November 2008. The Third expansion set Cataclysm, was announced at BlizzCon 2009. With more than 11.5 monthly subscribers World of Warcraft is currently the world's most subscribed MMORPG and holds the Guinness Book Record for the most popular MMORPG. In April 2008, World of Warcraft was estimated to hold 62% of the MMORPG subscription market. In 2008, Blizzard was honored at the 59th Annual Technology & Engineering Emmy Awards for the creation of World of Warcraft. Mike Morhaime accepted the award. In 2009 Blizzard also announced two more title releases, StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty and Diablo III.