firaxis and atari and infogrames, oh my

[slothman]

What is the difference between what these two companies do for civ3? I thought that Firaxis did the actual coding and testing while Atari made the physical cd's and boxes and shipped them to stores. Many people seem to think that Atari does the coding and never mention Firaxis anymore. Even people from there don't post while "Atarians" do. Did they merge? I know Atari bought Infogrames. What will be on the Conquests box? Firaxis and Infogrames are on my box, non-PTW.

 

[Hygro]

Infogrames bought Atari and then changed their name IIRC.

Firaxis designed the game then Atari published.

On conquests you will see Atari, Firaxes and Breakaway.

 

[Strider]

Originally posted by Hygro
Infogrames bought Atari and then changed their name IIRC.

Firaxis designed the game then Atari published.

On conquests you will see Atari, Firaxes and Breakaway.

What did breakaway do then?

 

[CivCube]

Firaxis is currently working on other projects, so they gave a hefty portion of Conquests to BreakAway for them to work on. Some Firaxians are corraborating, such as Jesse Smith, who I believe is the producer.

 

[Strider]

Originally posted by CivCube
Firaxis is currently working on other projects, so they gave a hefty portion of Conquests to BreakAway for them to work on. Some Firaxians are corraborating, such as Jesse Smith, who I believe is the producer.

Ahh, Ok.... So later on we might find Breakaway instead of firaxis producing the Civ series...

 

[Padma]

Originally posted by Strider
Ahh, Ok.... So later on we might find Breakaway instead of firaxis producing the Civ series...

Only if Firaxis sells them the Civ copyright.

But when you get Conquests, you will have a LOT of design & development work done by Breakaway.

Firaxis designed and developed (coded) CivIII. Also PTW. For Conquests, they enlisted the aid of Breakaway Games. (But I believe Firaxis gets the final say on anything designed/coded.)

Atari/Infogrames is the Publisher. They take the game, package it, market it, and hope they make enough money to satisfy both them and Firaxis.

 

[Strider]

Originally posted by Padma
Atari/Infogrames is the Publisher. They take the game, package it, market it, and hope they make enough money to satisfy both them and Firaxis.

And prolly Firaxis gets enough money to statisfy both them and breakaway.

 

[Civrules]

And another question:

About how many "Civilization III" series do they sell in one year around the world?

I have no clue.

 

[warpstorm]

The publisher (Atari) is the one who puts up the upfront money to pay for the development of the game. They do a lot more than just ship and market the game. They take the financial risk.

 

[Padma]

True, Warpstorm. I had negelected to mention that part.

 

[Grey Fox]

Originally posted by warpstorm
The publisher (Atari) is the one who puts up the upfront money to pay for the development of the game. They do a lot more than just ship and market the game. They take the financial risk.

And they get most of the money from the sales aswell.

I would guess Firaxis only gets 3%-6% of the money you pay for the game.

 

[Chieftess]

Then there's the retail stores who reserve space on the shelves for the games. If a company delays it, then there's a hefty fine (not sure if it's per day or per week - but, it can be over $150,000). I think big companies (like Microsoft) can either get around that, or deal with the fine. That's why companies rarely delay games. That's why game companies are forced to have a short deadline sometimes. And it's not just games at retail stores, it goes for anything. "The buck stops there".

Remember a console PSX (and NES/SNES) gaming company called Enix? They delayed their games once too often...

 

[samildanach]

But when you get Conquests, you will have a LOT of design & development work done by Breakaway.

What sort of track record does Breakaway have? I hadn't realised that they were doing the conquests D&D- I had the bizarre idea that they were just employed to orchestrate the conquests bug hunt which if anything like PTW would keep a number of software houses in gainful employment for years.
It goes without saying that I would be reticent to hand over my cash to a bunch of "johnny come latelys" who had not proven themselves in strategy gaming if that's in fact the case.

 

[Smellincoffee]

Breakaway has designed to my knowledge Waterloo- Napoleon's Last Battle! and Austerlitz- Napoleon's Greatest Triumph. They're both real-time, however. I enjoyed Waterloo somewhat, but I prefer Sid's own Gettysburg and Antietam. Both, however, recieved good reviews in the press. PC Gamer, for example, gave Waterloo a 90%. I never have played Austerlitz, though.

 

[samildanach]

Thanks Smellincoffee- it's good to know that they have some experience at RTS at least. I guess that's why firaxis have chosen to bring these guys in- did these games have MP?

 

[warpstorm]

Every one of those had MP. In addition, they did expansions for the Impressions city building games and Tropico, as well as Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom.

Oh yeah, they also did Sid Meier's Antietam and South Mountain.