Obsidian Entertainment

Obsidian Entertainment

Type	Private
Founded	Santa Ana, California (2003)
Headquarters	Irvine, California[1]
Key people	Feargus Urquhart, CEO Chris Parker, COO Darren Monahan, CIO Chris Avellone, CCO Chris Jones, CTO
Products	Star Wars: KotOR II Neverwinter Nights 2" "Fallout: New Vegas" (See complete products listing)
Employees	135 (2008)
Website	www.obsidianent.com

Obsidian Entertainment is an American video game developer founded in 2003 after the disestablishment of Interplay Productions' Black Isle Studios, for PC and console systems. Obsidian continues to operate under management by its founding officers: Feargus Urquhart (CEO), Chris Parker (COO), Darren Monahan (CTO), Chris Avellone (CCO) and Chris Jones (CTO).

Games history

On March 23, 2006, Obsidian and SEGA announced that they would co-develop a role-playing game based on a new franchise.^[2] It was revealed to be Alpha Protocol, an RPG set in a modern-day spy adventure setting, which was released on June 1, 2010.^[3]

On December 13, 2006, SEGA officially announced that Obsidian Entertainment had been signed to develop a role-playing game based on the Aliens film franchise.^[4] However, it has since been canceled.^[5] Another game called Seven Dwarves (working title) was also canceled.^[6][7]

On April 20, 2009, Bethesda Softworks announced that a new game in the Fallout series, Fallout: New Vegas would be developed by Obsidian. It was released in October 2010.^[8]

On February 11, 2010, Red Eagle Games and Obsidian announced that they would co-develop game(s) based on the Wheel of Time series of fantasy novels by author Robert Jordan.^[9]

At E3 2010 it was announced^[10] that Obsidian would be developing Dungeon Siege 3 for Square Enix. The game was released in 2011.

On September 1, 2011, Square Enix announced that the Treasures of the Sun DLC was forthcoming, with an anticipated release in October 2011.^[11]

Obsidian Entertainment revealed that they had been working on a canceled project called Alien RPG. The game was canceled for unknown reasons.^[12] They also revealed that they are pitching an unknown original IP to several publishers and are getting very good results.^[13]

Games developed

• Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords (2004) (Xbox, PC)
• Neverwinter Nights 2 (2006) (PC, Mac OS X)
• Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer (2007) (PC)
• Neverwinter Nights 2: Storm of Zehir (2008) (PC)
• Alpha Protocol (2010) (PC, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3)
• Fallout: New Vegas (2010)^[8] (Windows, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3)
• Dungeon Siege III (2011)^[14] (Windows, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3)
• Wheel of Time (in development)^[15] (Windows, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3)

See also

• BioWare
• Black Isle Studios
• Bethesda Softworks
• Troika Games

References

1. ^ Mueller, Mark (2008-08-11). "Game Companies Taking Office Space at Faster Clip". Orange County Business Journal: p. 82. 
2. ^ "SEGA Partners with Obsidian Entertainment to Create Original Content for Next Generation Consoles". BusinessWire. 2006-03-23. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0EIN/is_/ai_n26804618?tag=artBody;col1. Retrieved 2008-11-01. 
3. ^ "SEGA And Obsidian Set To Redefine The RPG Genre With Alpha Protocol". SEGA News. SEGA Corporation. 2008-03-13. http://www.sega.com/news/?n=1851. Retrieved 2008-11-01. 
4. ^ "SEGA Signs Obsidian Entertainment To Develop Alien Title For Next-generation Systems". SEGA News. SEGA Corporation. 2006-12-13. http://www.sega.com/news/?n=1962. Retrieved 2008-11-01. 
5. ^ "Obsidian's Aliens RPG Officially Finished". Giant Bomb. 2009-06-26. http://www.giantbomb.com/news/obsidians-aliens-rpg-officially-finished/1492/. Retrieved 2009-06-26. 
6. ^ "Former Obsidian artist Ian Ameling's resume". http://www.ianameling.com/resume.pdf. 
7. ^ Massey, Dana (2007-06-29). "Dev Profile Q&A: Kevin Saunders, Lead Designer on NWN2: MotB". Warcry Network. Themis Media. http://www.warcry.com/articles/view/interviews/devprofiles/4784-Neverwinter-Nights-2-Dev-Profile-Q-A-Kevin-Saunders-NWN2-Lead-Designer. Retrieved 2007-05-30. "I was the lead designer on project "New Jersey," which was never announced, and then helped with finishing up NWN2 over its last six months or so." 
8. ^ ^{a b} "Fallout: New Vegas unveiled". Ellie Gibson. Eurogamer. 2009-04-20. http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/fallout-new-vegas-unveiled. Retrieved 2009-04-20. 
9. ^ "Red Eagle Games partners with Obsidian". Dragonmount. 2010-02-11. http://www.dragonmount.com/forums/blog/2/entry-294-red-eagle-games-partners-with-obsidian/. Retrieved 2010-02-13. 
10. ^ . http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/28977/E3_Square_Enix_Owns_Dungeon_Siege_IP_Moves_Into_Western_RPG_Market.php/. 
11. ^ "Treasures of the Sun DLC Press Release". 2011-09-26. http://forums.obsidian.net/index.php?showtopic=58757/. 
12. ^ "Alien RPG canceled". http://www.gamestm.co.uk/interviews/obsidians-fergus-urquhart-talks-dungeon-siege-iii-fallout-new-vegas-and-the-developers-planned-new-ip/3/. Retrieved 26 July 2011. 
13. ^ "Obsidian's unknown IP". http://www.gamestm.co.uk/interviews/obsidians-fergus-urquhart-talks-dungeon-siege-iii-fallout-new-vegas-and-the-developers-planned-new-ip/2/. Retrieved 26 July 2011. 
14. ^ "Square Enix announces partnership with Obsidian Entertainment for Dungeon Siege 3". Square Enix. June 7, 2010. http://release.square-enix.com/na/2010/06/08_01.html. Retrieved June 7, 2010. 
15. ^ "Obsidian riding Wheel of Time". Red Eagle Entertainment. February 12, 2010. http://www.gamespot.com/pc/action/thewheeloftimereg/news/6250423/obsidian-riding-wheel-of-time?tag=newsfeatures%3Btitle%3B1. Retrieved May 23, 2010. 

External links

• Official website
• Obsidian Entertainment on Twitter
• Obsidian Entertainment's Facebook