EA Visceral Melbourne shutting down - Report

Tough times indeed :(

[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]

A real shame to Aus Gaming Community. Would be awesome to see more australian developers shine. Best of luck to the individuals who lost their jobs

What they did great games like godfather series and dante what wont see 2nd day light of day. But main thing dead space 1 and 2 so f you EA Games

Tough times we're living in.....

Times is hard on the boulevard...

Real sad for Aussie game industry.

Its not so good for the austrailian game industry. And it doesn't seem to be because of crappy games too.....look at team bondi

The Melbourne studio is down. I feel sorry for the peoples now out of work. EA has a studio in Vancouver. Which is "Melbourne's Cyborg Doppleganger". A similar city that just "sucks" It is no Melbourne but EA is still open there. Hopefully the people will find work. Over there, or over here. Even if Vancouver "Sucks"

NNOOOOO!!!!! NOT BLUE TONGUE STUDIOS!!!!! :( I really wanted to work for them :( Where is that smilie that makes the face cry tears? Oh well....with the game developer closures that are happening since the last few years I may as well have to aim for Japan if there is still a Japan in the next few years by the time I finish university in 2015.

That's a real shame! Dead Space is a great title. It has a lot of replay value and just plain fun. And while I liked The Godfather 1 and 2 , nost didi not like the second. But I found it to be quite enjoying.Kind of like GTA but with Godfather characters.Dante's Inferno could have bben so much better, (so could Godfather 2) that to be it was disapointing. but I could be in the minority. Either way, this a d*** shame!

That makes no sense, Dead Space was set to be a big franchise. I really am losing faith in gaming.

I feel sorry for the staff, and besides Dante's inferno was a good game.

@Brokenhope69 That's exactly what you said. EA has been the PUBLISHER. Not the Developer. Bottom line, we owe nothing to EA in that regard. Every single of those games would have come out just the same without them. Many of them, came out worse than they should have, because of EA influence and will to rush thing in order to make more money, more fast. And some of the titles you mention, are not EA, like Mass Effect. Mass Effect is Bioware. EA only bought Bioware after the success of Mass Effect, aiming to cash in with the already under development Mass Effect 2. Crysis, the same. Only after the success of Crysis, they went and cashed in for Crysis 2.

damn. dead space was one of the best this gen. thats terrible news. i pray for the best for those who are involved.

This is so sad, especially since I loved Dante's Inferno. I hope they find work soon.

It's sad, so many studios closed down this year. Best of wishes to the workers and I hope they find a job soon! Game developing is such a fragile job... They mentioned the original Dead Space, but not the sequel, maybe we will get Dead Space 3 regardless?

damn it... after feeling the immense satisfaction from playing both Dead Space 1 & 2, i was very looking forward to a 3rd one, i may not fully enjoy the business practices of EA itself, but with this i hope EA manages to retain that title

I hate reading stories of the loss of jobs. Being part of a household that's been greatly affected by this global recession, I sympathize with the folks at Visceral Melbourne. I hope you all land on your feet.

EA has been a publisher for tons of great games. Far from evil in my opinion. Hating EA is like saying you hate American McGee's Alice, Army of Two, Battlefield, Battlefield: Bad Company, Black, Bulletstorm, Crysis, Dante's Inferno, Darkspore, Dead Space, Dragon Age, Freedom Fighters, Half-Life, Left 4 Dead, Mass Effect, Medal of Honor, Mirror's Edge, Overstrike, The Orange Box, Portal 2, Shank, Shadows of the Damned, The Saboteur, The Sims, Syndicate, Space Hulk, TimeSplitters, Ultima. Need I say more?!

It's sad thing to see the Australian game industry colapse like this.

Gamespot is the cesspool of the gaming community, Thank god Gertsman gate happened as all the great editors may still be here. I really do not know why I even scroll down to the comments as its general population are the pond life of the gaming community that spout nothing but biased(negative & positive) opinions and gamespot caters to it with their pathetic system wars forum and constant fanning the flames articles. I used to really like this place back in the good old days, But hey maybe its for the best as all the good staff and the good people of the forums moved to a great website, Lets just hope the pond life stay here and don't emerge from the swamp. Long live giantbomb.com.

Dante, Dead Space were two of my favorite games. The DEV crews on those games did some of the best work ever. I feel for those guys & gals.

Sad news for employees. All the best for future folks.

Lots of Australian shops shutting down, which is unfortunate to see. Five dollars for a prediction on at least one employee lawsuit for being overworked, any takers?

Dante's Inferno was front loaded. All the best stuff was early in the game then it went downhill. Dead Space i hope stays afloat with EA.

Loved Dante's Inferno. I hope this won't affect the sequel we were promised at the end

"So long and thanks for all the fish" comes to mind.

@mercutio665 About that friend of yours,I really hope he's right about ME3 being awesome,ME is a great franchise,and I really want for Shepard's story to end on a high note.But only time will tell and I must admit,Im quite sceptical about it...

And I thought you were talking about the Tiberium game that never got through it's production cycle after releasing a cool trailer and everything. My bad.

@ Rocker6 It's fine, dude. You are entitled to your opinion and certainly don't owe me an explanation. But if Mass Effect 3 blows, you're going to blame EA. All I was trying to say was that my friend in Edmonton (who is producing ME3) assures me that EA has nothing to do with development and that Bioware just draws from their resources. So in the end, if this game sucks, you should be blaming Bioware. That being said, he also tells me that the game is awesome. So... yeah.

@mercutio665 After DA2,Im afraid Bioware might start going downhill,just look how ME3 looks almost identical to ME2,I see almost no true improvements.That would be really sad,Bioware made some of my fav RPGs ever.How is releasing a sub par game that destroys everything the franchise once stood for better for it?Spyware-while its true most programs have some pieces in spyware in them,Origin has a huge one,that "data mines" your PC,also I hear lot of ppl are complaining about huge techincal problems with Origin(fortunately I never installed that crap,and I never will).You may say anything,but I hate EA,I understand they are buisness corporation,but there are corporations out there that dont have a huge number of haters who hate them for a lot of good reasons like EA does.

@ Rocker6 I thought that's what you might say. My buddy is a producer at Bioware and has been there for over 6 years. He says that moving to EA actually strengthened their studios, and that EA has given them total freedom to make games the way they've always made games. Bioware has always shipped quality titles (with a few exceptions), so why would EA change their tried, tested and true methodology? EA just wants a share of the money that comes in for those games. As for Tiberium, it was canned because of quality issues - they did NOT want to release a sub-par game, even though they had already invested millions in production. This, if you ask me, was not only honest, but better for the franchise. As for spyware I'm not exactly sure what you're talking about, but you'd be hard pressed to find software that doesn't in this day and age. Look, it's not like I'm the hugest fan of EA and their policies, but I wouldn't go so far as to say they are "evil". They're a huge corporation, and when you're a big name in this game there are a lot of people waiting to throw mud at you.

People, Visceral Games is not shutting down. One branch office of Visceral Games is shutting down. Visceral Games as an entity, including it's main office in California, is still going.

@mercutio665 Destroying many great studious,right now they are slowly destroying Bioware,putting spyware in products,extreme milking of some franchises like Madden,or to sum things up,more info on this site:<< LINK REMOVED >> EDIT:Forgot to mention introduction of Online Passes,Always online DRM in PC games,and of course,destruction of a great Tiberium Wars franchise.

Well no wonder Godfather 2 people should b hang 4 that game

@ Rocker6 What makes EA "ultra-evil"?

Deadspace is developed mostly out of Visceral's Los Angeles and Redwood Shores studios, with support from Melbourne and Montreal. If you're going to be upset about this, be upset that talented people are losing jobs. You're precious titles will still ship out regardless of the outcome.

I would be happy if EA shut itself down,and if all great studios it destroys with time,like Bioware broke free and survived on their own,or at least got bought by some "normal",not ultra evil companies.

these kinds of stories are starting to crop up more-and-more...at least it isn't like Team Bondi :)

Hope they re-open as an independent gaming developer, out of EA's decaying hands.

News like this makes one think whether game-making corporations consider Australia a worthwhile market or not. :?

For the love of Kratos people, DO SOME RESEARCH BEFORE COMMENTING; "Visceral Games is located in Redwood Shores, California at the same site location as the EA corporate headquarters. Visceral Games has branch offices in Melbourne, Australia as well as Montreal, Canada." It's not Visceral that is getting shut down, it's one of their offices in Australia.

I cant believe that. Dead space is one of my fave games this gen. I hate the state that the world is in!

what??? visceral games? the studio that make dead space series and dantes inferno? is this right?? whats comes next? Dice?

No not them! Damn you EA. :(

"Fire the competent, reward the incompetent" That is EA's line of work.

Another firm going (down) under, excuse the pun, it's pretty bad news, and i'm curious to see what that unannounced title is.

[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster]