Inteplay Back in Business, Fallout MMO on the Cards
It’s been a while.
Yes, the news that’s been hanging around the interweb for months now has officially surfaced: Interplay is building up a development team, and looking to begin a Fallout MMO.
The beleaguered publisher was delisted from the NASDAQ and pretty much closed down in 2004. Its famous internal studio Black Isle was packed up, members going on to work at studios like Obsidian and Troika. The publisher, however, retained its name and intellectual property, inluding Fallout, Earthworm Jim, MDK and Descent / Freespace.
In 2007, the Fallout property was flogged to Bethesda (who are now working on Fallout 3) for just under $6 million. Importantly, though, Interplay retained the rights to develop an MMO based on the Fallout universe.
With cash in pocket, the publisher is now recruiting for its new internal development team, and looking for financing for its two pronged development plan – the Fallout MMO and the reinvigoration of other, smaller IPs.
There’s a long road ahead for Interplay. Its strength as a publisher was always the pull of its development teams, so with Black Isle, Volition, Bioware and Shiny all either dissolved or otherwise engaged, starting from scratch could be a tall order.
Still, a new team and fantastic IP can’t be a bad start.
Tags: Interplay, MMOs, Studio Status
April 9th, 2008 at 10:50 am
It’d be great to see some of these properties return, but it’s going to take a lot more than £6 million to develop a decent MMO, and without the creative strength of its old internal teams / partners I think things are far from steady.
These are seriously well-loved properties… do you think a new team do them justice?
April 11th, 2008 at 3:43 am
Wow, I didnt even hear about Interplay closing its doors. Was wondering why I havent seen alot of their games for a while. I liked alot of their games. Hope they can get back up on their feet again.
April 11th, 2008 at 5:33 pm
Starting back from Vault Zero?It’s good 2 hear U R alive and kickin’…the Brotherhood shall raise again! I will send word 2 the Wasteland 2 awake my brethren and bring new recruits 2 the Brotherhood of Steel…
Paladin LucAS
April 11th, 2008 at 7:19 pm
As for me i think if they will create MMO based of Fallout 2, but with new graphic it would be super. Long time ago i read about it on german site. They had alot of great ideas. I think it has all chance to become legendary MMO.
April 12th, 2008 at 8:20 am
bring back red neck rampage!…lol…long live bubba!!!!
April 13th, 2008 at 9:04 pm
Well, geez… I hardly know what to say. In a world where a game can be COMPLETE, and READY TO SHIP, and then just disappear forever, what do we say about “confirmation” that a “defunct” publisher is about to “re-invent” one of the greatest phenomenons since the Beatles? I have to suspect that the original “confirmation” was released on April 1st (April Fools day !!!!). If however it does see the light of day, and it runs as smooth as World of Warcraft… and it plays well… World of Warcraft watch out !!!! Here comes FALLOUT !!!!! (NO WATER CHIPS BREAKING DOWN!!!!! EVER!!!!!!)