emergent-game-technologies
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Gamebryo creator Emergent snapped up by anonymous party
Emergent Game Technologs has had a rough run recently. First, the developer of the Gamebryo engine puts its whole business up for sale in November. Then, just a few weeks ago, Bethesda reveals that it's breaking with tradition and not employing Gamebryo in the latest Elder Scrolls game, Skyrim. This latest development? Well, it could go either way. The company has been purchased by an anonymous buyer, according to Develop. Whether or not this is good news for Emergent and its staff really depends on who this new buyer is and what their intentions are. Hopefully we'll have a clearer picture when the developer's identity is revealed "soon."
Emergent to sell Gamebryo and the rest of its assets
If you've played Fallout 3 or Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, you're actually familiar with Gamebryo, even if you don't know it. It's a studio owned by Emergent Game Technologies, crafting middleware tech for tons of companies like Bethesda and Square Enix, whose biggest claim to fame is its Gamebryo Lightspeed engine, used in "over 350 games so far." And today the studio, along with the rest of Emergent's properties, including its IP (whole or in part), were put up for sale. The sales of asset notice comes from Gerbsman Partners via a post on the Blog of Intellectual Capital and details the current state of Emergent, a company which managed to lose revenue in the ballpark of $30 million since being founded in 2005 on through 2009. This year, the company actually showed a bit of profit, albeit a relatively small amount, nothing that could get Emergent back into the black. What's unclear as of right now is the future of Emergent: it hasn't filed for bankruptcy, but one could assume that selling all of your stuff means you're getting out of the business for good. We've contacted Emergent for some additional info and will update accordingly.
Gorilla Banana studios and Emergent announce partnership for Red Blood
What do you get when you combine Emergent's Gamebryo engine, a developer with the arguably awesome name of Gorilla Banana, and a bunch of genetically-altered super-humans who each want to rule the world? Red Blood. Emergent Game Technologies and Korean developer Gorilla Banana have put their collective heads together to further create this futuristic MMO. Players of Red Blood will choose one of four countries to join -- Victoria, Kulitie à Khuril-Tai, Normu à Nomos, and Peiladulia à Phratria. Each country has different character traits and attributes to its advantage, but the citizens are all after the same goal: world domination. You'll join your "new and improved" countrymen in a bid to make your country the ruling power. Gorilla Banana's site states that Red Blood has been in alpha since July of 2007, so hopefully the announcement of the partnership with Emergent means that we'll be hearing more from Red Blood soon.
Square Enix using Gamebryo engine, let's guess what for
Square Enix today announced that it has licensed Emergent Game Technologies' Gamebryo engine, the backbone of such titles as Fallout 3 and Warhammer Online. The press release contains no mention of Square's intended use for the engine, but we have our suspicions. We've ruled out Final Fantasy XIII, since even though work on the Xbox 360 version won't begin until the PS3's is finished, Square is using its cross-platform Crystal Tools engine to develop the title. The most likely candidate, then, would be the yet untitled "original action game" being produced at the publisher's new El Segundo, Calif. dev studio. The specific variant of Gamebryo licensed -- Floodgate -- is intended to make porting multi-processor code written for one platform onto another an effortless task, providing extra time to optimize the game for the unique capabilities of each individual platform. Sounds perfect for a new team working on a new title from a Western (read: multiplatform) mindset. When contacted, a Square Enix rep told us the company "will hopefully have something to announce soon."
Tiny Angels coming to Wiis with the help of Gamebryo
Are you keeping up with your South American telenovelas? If so, you've probably heard of Chiquititas. If not, which is probably the case, the show (known in English as Tiny Angels) is a fictional series about a group of orphans in Buenos Aires.You're probably worriedly wondering what this has to do with the Wii, so let's just rip the band-aid right off. Portugal based developer Biotroid is making a Wii game about the series. Interestingly enough, though, the game is being published by Emergent Game Technologies, who are giving Biotroid access to the Gamebryo engine. In case you haven't been keeping up, that's the same engine that's been powering games like Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion and Civilization IV. Obviously, Emergent is looking to cash in on the success of the popular Argentinian show.Let's be honest -- we don't have high hopes for this game, which will be a platformer of sorts. Aside from licensed games usually being terrible, Tiny Angels seems like a particularly stupid license to use. But, in some crazy twist of fate, this has the potential to be one of the prettiest titles on the Wii.
