Slasher on 21/1/2014 at 01:01
Two weeks in and I continue to get mail for my apartment's previous tenant. I've already ripped open one cable bill thinking it was my own before realizing a bit too late that it definitely wasn't. A less awkward delivery arrived in the form of the current issue of
Game Informer. In the process of stacking it in the growing pile of mail to be forwarded, I happened across an article chronicling LucasArts long, sad, painful, and funny death. Some key points:
* LucasArts went through four different CEO's between 2004 and 2013. Technically it might have been more like five, since the company was co-directed by two people in the end.
* One of these CEOs, Jim Ward, was "that boss," the one everyone dreads going to meetings with. His antics compelled employees to show up early just to get one of the "edge" seats at the periphery of the room to better avoid scrutiny. Ward supposedly put a lot of weight in the assessments of QA departments (focus groups, anyone?), but nobody had the wherewithal to tell him no.
* During the development of
Fracture, George Lucas decided he didn't like the name of the protagonist Mason Briggs. Lucas recommended "B.J. Dart," much to the consternation of a dev team that had spent considerable time brainstorming during naming conventions to come up with Mason Briggs.
* Free Radical, the developer behind the aborted
Battlefront 3, told LucasArts they were aiming for seamless transitions between ground, air, and space battles sporting a hundred players. Their development build bogged down with twenty players.
*
Battlefront 3 apparently became a sort of black hole for time and money. Tensions between LucasArts and Free Radical rose, and LA representatives were even denied access to FR's offices at one point.
* LucasArts eventually cut funding to Free Radical. Free Radical responded with a profanity laced video mocking LucasArts and their policies. The business relationship didn't outlive the video by long.
* Then LA creative director Adam Orth tried to revive the project with
SOCOM developer Slant Six to no avail. gg Orth
* Both
Force Unleashed and
Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings were slated for a 2007 release date. Guess which one made it and which one didn't.
*
Staff of Kings was supposed to be a third person action/adventure game with a cistern level and a jungle environment with "run-for-your-life" moments, not unlike another third person action game that rhymes with
Uncharted. New LA CEO Daniel Rodriguez assessed the dev team's progress on
Staff of Kings when he took over and that was the end of Indiana Jones and the Game that was Doomed.
* "Starkiller" was originally a placeholder name for the player's avatar in
Force Unleashed. When the dev team tried to get Lucas to sign off on an official "Darth" title, Lucas, in all seriousness, suggested "Darth Icky" and "Darth Insanius" at one meeting. There was silence. The expected "psyche" from Lucas never came, and after more silence, and without acknowledgement of his suggestions, ol' George moved on to the next subject.
*
Force Unleashed ended up going with "Starkiller."
* Just prior to E3 2013, Lucas decided the lead character in
Star Wars: 1313 should be Boba Fett. This derailed the development team so badly, and with such little notice before E3, that their representatives at the Expo lied about who the game's protagonist was really going to be.
Inline Image:
https://encrypted-tbn1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRwdyv5QNiKeOHD1jPdEJMlYlTJz-dDL_whYt6XiUn2Mx3egPXBOgThere you have it. From
Battlehawks 1942 to
Star Wars: Kinect, it's been a B.J. of a ride! :angel:
Inline Image:
http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/17igz0i4m3ijbgif/ku-xlarge.gif