Activision Shuts Down California Studio

[Junaid Alam]

Activision Shuts Down California Studio

Publisher Activision confirmed it is closing down its Foster City, Calif. studio by the end of May.

"Activision is closing its Foster City development studio which had less than 45 employees," an Activision spokesperson said. "We are currently making efforts to find opportunities for all employees at other Activision studios."

The 45-person studio, formerly known as Z-Axis, was responsible for the Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX and Aggressive Inline series. Activision made the acquisition in 2002 and the studio was re-branded Underground Development in February.

It was most recently charged with the PlayStation 3 version of Quake Wars, an class-based online multiplayer first-person shooter title. The port will be released at the end of May. The 360 version was developed by Nerve Software.

Source: Gamesindustry.biz [http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/activision-confirms-underground-closure]

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[Melaisis]

Logical.

Z-Axis haven't done their sports games in a while. A shame, really, as I personally recall that Aggressive Inline was quite an achievement, especially when compared to similar games based on alternate skating. Well, it had a decent soundtrack at least. For a 14 year old to listen to. In summer. The point is, these guys were used to those sorts of games, no damn 'Quake Wars'! They were created as a small studio, and was idiocy on Activision's part to expect such a relatively tiny team to have to capacity to deal with bigger projects.