R.I.P. Pandemic
It wasn’t unexpected news, but it’s news none the less that EA has decided to shutter Pandemic, a studio they were eager to purchase back in 2007. Unfortunately, that means the studio’s final project, the intriguing and nearly finished Saboteur, will be passed off to another part of the EA empire to be completed, and the folks who did the hard labour won’t be around to enjoy their (hopeful) success.
While Pandemic did have a streak of solid titles, including the highly succesful Star Wars: Battlefront, recent history had not been so kind, including the spectacular failure of the Australian office’s Dark Knight game, a failure so significant that it let to the closing of that studio, and may have been the tipping point for the end of Pandemic as a whole.
The closing of Pandemic comes amidst massive cutbacks by EA, including the cutting of 1,500 jobs company-wide. While the studio is done, and Saboteur will be finished, EA plans to continue to exploit the Pandemic brand and its popular franchises.
As Kotaku points out, Pandemic now joins a rather illustrious list of quality studios that EA has acquired over the years, and have failed to thrive. This includes Origin Systems, Bullfrog Productions, Black Box Games, Maxis, Westwood Studios and now, the dearly departed Pandemic.
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