Five That Fell

Ground Glass writes "The games industry is as cutthroat as any in entertainment or tech, and it so happens that many loved, respected, and influential companies nevertheless get crushed in the waves of hardware transitions or left behind by market forces. Given that one of those shifts is rapidly approaching, now is as good a time as any to look at five such companies that are no longer with us, but are still remembered and revered by their fans."

And a moment of Silence for...

[Dr. Eggman]

All those companies lost to EAssimilation:

Maxis...
Westwood Studios...
Mythic Entertainment...
ect...

*cries*

OT: noisy banners!?

[Bastian]

You want to know a great way to get me to stop reading your article right away?

Include a banner ad that makes a lot of annoying noises that appear without warning and are deafeningly loud, especially through headphones. Of course, simply causing physical pain for your readers is never a good stopping point, so why not add insult to injury by giving no way to turn the damn ad off?

And then all the bad formatting. . . great job, guys.

They left out

[owlman17]

Infocom. The flag-bearer of text-adventure gaming. Brought us dozens of hits like the Zork trilogy, Enchanter trilogy, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, etc, etc. You didn't need the latest and the greatest GPU to play those games. There are still indie text-adventures but the genre practically died with the company. Oh I just miss those days. Reading "You are likely to be eaten by a grue" sent more chills up my spine than seeing the most grotesque creature from (insert latest FPS using latest cutting edge 3D engine here) at maximum settings.

Where's Microprose?

[GutSh0t]

Article seems to focus on companies that were players in late 90s on. Microprose made many classics: Xcom series, Master of Magic, Master of Orion, Railroad tycoon, and many others.

Re:Manic....the person I missed

[Robaato]

That'd be Maniac, if I recall correctly.

Also, I recall dealing with being forced to have Maniac as my wingman in the earlier games by shooting him down myself, and just flying the rest of that branch of the story without a wingman. Plus I got to say some moving words at his funeral!

Re:And a moment of Silence for...

[Danse]

Don't forget Bullfrog, though. They made the original God game, were a key player in the Sim game field and always had an air of wit around them that made all of their games comedy gold, as well as good fun.

They made Syndicate!! While Populous was cool, nothing compared to Syndicate at the time. They could recreate it today and it would probably still be regarded as a fantastic game.