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Fallen kingdom: 38 Studios' collapse and the pitfalls of using public money to support tech companies
In a career filled with many clutch throws from the baseball mound, former Boston Red Sox ace Curt Schilling's main calling card was a gutsy post-season performance made even more memorable by a blood-soaked sock. It was a pitch made by Schilling outside of Major League Baseball, however, that would prove to be his most daring one yet. In 2010, Schilling convinced Rhode Island officials to give his video game company, 38 Studios, a $75 million loan guarantee. A self-professed fan of massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPG), Schilling's dream was to create a worthy competitor to Blizzard's MMORPG juggernaut, World of Warcraft. In 2006, Schilling started Green Monster Games, which was later renamed 38 Studios. Luring the company away from Massachusetts was supposed to bring in more than 400 jobs and serve as the linchpin for launching a new tech-based industry in Rhode Island. Instead, the state's taxpayers found themselves left at the table with a multimillion-dollar tab.
