Atari Sells Civilization Franchise!

Is there any relation of this news (the sale of the franchise) and the news a couple of days ago about job opportunities at firaxis? Isn't it pretty obvious firaxis is hiring staff to produce Civ4?
 
socralynnek said:
Ahem, for example, ahem, yeah, like Coca-Cola. And with every bottle you buy, you get a code for turning on a new unit...

And if you buy ten bottles, they fix the submarine bug.
 
sir_schwick said:
Maybe we got lucky and Brian Reynolds convinced Microsoft to shell out the bucks and let Big Huge Games help finish developement.
Oh, Please, gagh me with a spoon! After what BHG did with Rise of Nations, you are honoring them WAY too much. RoN is a pretty, but shallow game, despite all the layers added to it. Brian's glory is in the past, he's a "HAS been!"
 
bluebox said:
Is there any relation of this news (the sale of the franchise) and the news a couple of days ago about job opportunities at firaxis? Isn't it pretty obvious firaxis is hiring staff to produce Civ4?
It's hiring staff to develop Civ 4. ;) An expert scenario maker would have nothing to do with publishing the game. They'll obviously still develop it, the question is whether or not they'll OWN it.
 
Further to Bluebox's point that Firaxis are hiring staff to work on Civ 4, I have to wonder why now?

Is it not possible that the new owner has said to Firaxis something like "Good job so far, but get it finished by Easter!" :p
Therefore the need to hire new staff.

If there has been a new shorter timetable imposed on Firaxis,it is likely to lead to trouble!
 
A few people here are concerned about a company buying it to "shut it down." I do not see that as there is no question the Civilization is the King of the genre. If you attempt to do that, even if u have a product you believe is competing, you would have a difficult time making your money back due to the high price you had to pay to aquire the rights to the more successful product.

This type of action generally occurs when a producer of a successful product sees an up-and-coming product and "buys it up" to avoid competition. That simply doesn't make sense here.

My greater concern is that they will push the timeable up for firaxis too much, though late fall is an ideal lauch time for new games.
 
One could hope it's Firaxis, if not - they could make it like a Call to Power game. But there has to be somesort of deal that gives them the right to produce civ4 even if the publishing rights get sold. Killing the project to let someoneelse, like a Microsoft team, develop it, isn't a nice scenario.
 
Trip said:
I imagine that it would in some way... Atari is the one that paid Firaxis to develop the game. If Firaxis bought the franchise, then that's great news. If it was sold to someone else, then essentially Firaxis has a new boss with a new place to get their paychecks from. ;)
Well, that's assuming this new buyer wants Firaxis to make the next Civ game. It's possible they don't, and they might even have the right idea.
 
Trip said:
Alright, found an article saying that Infogrames bought Civilization along with Hasbro

Considering that Hasbro is still publicly traded, that article is clearly wrong. They might have bought Atari *from* Hasbro though, which would make sense since I thought Hasbro owned Atari. :p
 
I suppose it's too much to hope that it was bought by Blizzard? Good multiplayer support on free game servers and indefinite patches/support until they're satisfied with their final product? I might have to faint if that happened.
 
Considering that Hasbro is still publicly traded, that article is clearly wrong.
Hasbro sold their entire PC game branch, after desastrous results: they took over a number of smaller, but famous companies a few years ago, like Microprose or SSI, and managed to publish almost exclusively unfinished BS.
 
Quite right Doc. Us old wargamers are still shuddering at what they did to AH's Squad Leader.
 
If Microsoft buys it, it'll be forced into an Xbox game where anything challenging will be thrown away so the console zombies can play it. No more civil unrest, no more corruption, every square makes five food and shields, etc..
 
Kilroy said:
Well, that's assuming this new buyer wants Firaxis to make the next Civ game. It's possible they don't, and they might even have the right idea.
With well over a year of work already poured into the project and a good formula for success, I really don't see Firaxis losing its development role, no matter who buys it. Maybe for Civ 5, but definitely not for 4.
 
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