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Vicarious Visions merged into Blizzard, shifts to support "existing Blizzard games and initiatives"

GonSama

GonSama

Member
"Activision Blizzard has moved its Vicarious Visions studio from the Activision side of the business to the Blizzard side.

The publisher today told GamesIndustry.biz that effective today, it is merging Vicarious Visions into Blizzard Entertainment.

Going forward, the Vicarious Visions team of about 200 people will be employees of Blizzard and "fully dedicated to existing Blizzard games and initiatives," which means the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1+2 studio will no longer be creating games as the lead developer."

www.gamesindustry.biz

Vicarious Visions merged into Blizzard

Activision Blizzard has moved its Vicarious Visions studio from the Activision side of the business to the Blizzard sid…
www.gamesindustry.biz www.gamesindustry.biz

How is this possible?
They did amazing games that sold well (Crash Trilogy and THPS 1+ 2) and they simply destroy this great studio?

What's next, Toys for Bob?

Edit:
Jason Schreier's rumours:




GUcCIh5.png
 
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Knitted Knight

Knitted Knight

Banned
Did great work on the Crash Trilogy. Will always hold that group in high regard for reviving classics I love in such a good way.
 
kraspkibble

kraspkibble

Permabanned.
GonSama said:
"Activision Blizzard has moved its Vicarious Visions studio from the Activision side of the business to the Blizzard side.

The publisher today told GamesIndustry.biz that effective today, it is merging Vicarious Visions into Blizzard Entertainment.

Going forward, the Vicarious Visions team of about 200 people will be employees of Blizzard and "fully dedicated to existing Blizzard games and initiatives," which means the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1+2 studio will no longer be creating games as the lead developer."

www.gamesindustry.biz

Vicarious Visions merged into Blizzard

Activision Blizzard has moved its Vicarious Visions studio from the Activision side of the business to the Blizzard sid…
www.gamesindustry.biz www.gamesindustry.biz

Wtf?
They did amazing games that sold well (Crash Trilogy and THPS 1+ 2) and they simply destroy this great studio?

What's next, Toys for Bob?
Click to expand...
lol.

their best work being remakes of old games and helping Bungie create the PC version of Destiny 2. VV is definitely full of talented people but maybe they felt that talent would be better used helping existing games than making new games. there is a big difference between providing support for other studios/remaking games than creating a new IP.

they haven't destroyed anything. VV will really help improve the quality of Blizzard games.
 
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GonSama

GonSama

Member
lyra-ixi said:
lol.

their best work being remakes of old games and helping Bungie create the PC version of Destiny 2. VV is definitely full of talented people but maybe they felt that talent would be better used helping existing games than making new games. there is a big difference between providing support for other studios/remaking games than creating a new IP.

they haven't destroyed anything. VV will really help improve the quality of Blizzard games.
Click to expand...
You must be joking.
Blizzard games in the past years have been sh**.
And they really closed Vicarious Visions. You will never hear that name again.
They destroyed the studio just to support some bullshit Blizzard GaaS games.

Crash Trilogy sold more than 10M copies and was well received by critic and fans.
It's not just a lazy remake.
And THPS 1+ 2 was another great work.

But now they will support some bulls*** GaaS (Overwatch 2 or whatever).
Awesome news.
mansplaining don't tell me to smile GIF by Women's History Month
 
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GonSama

GonSama

Member
Elios83 said:
Wait so they studio was basically killed? :/
I did my part with Crash 4!
Click to expand...
Crash 4 developer was Toys for Bob, not VV.
And that game sold poorly for their standards.
If Crash Trilogy sold more than 10M and they still killed its studio...

Just hope that they don't close Toys for Bob too...
 
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harmny

harmny

Banned
Hey Kotick. i don't have a problem with you but if you destroy Beenox before releasing CTR nitro fueled on pc i'm gonna get you.
 
CamHostage

CamHostage

Member
lyra-ixi said:
their best work being remakes of old games and helping Bungie create the PC version of Destiny 2. VV is definitely full of talented people but maybe they felt that talent would be better used helping existing games than making new games. there is a big difference between providing support for other studios/remaking games than creating a new IP.
Click to expand...
Good lord, this is a tragic assessment of the noble studio Vicarious Visions.

For your work in making incredible portable games, for your dedication to old-school game mechanics across a variety of game genres, for your efforts in bringing back classic games with quality befitting their legacy (often for a company that doesn't seem to respect its own history,) for a history of products that made kids like me way back when and now kids of people I know happy, for your years of service, I salute you, Vicarious Visions.

1SaBZjF.jpg


I hope that the VV team members have a good future ahead working for Blizzard (you could do worse... you could be working for Activision,) but this is the end a number of eras for a company that did things I liked, even while working for a company that prioritized things I increasingly am not into. (Bringing Spyro and Crash out of the vaults was a start, but I don't think it's a direction they're serious about, and repurposing VV is a sign of that.)

BTW, the Games page on Activision's website right now literally doesn't list one single game - that's poetry in HTML, my friends.
 
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CamHostage

CamHostage

Member
GonSama said:
www.vvisions.com

Albany

Albany
www.vvisions.com www.vvisions.com
Their website is down...

RIP Vicarious Visions
Click to expand...
One ray of sunshine is that the founding Bala brothers left Vicarious Visions in 2016 (I'm not sure if other staff left with them?) and have since gone on to interesting developments with their next company. Velan Studios is the company behind the Nintendo Switch / RC Car hybrid Mario Kart Live Home Circuit.

Velan Studios | Home

www.velanstudios.com www.velanstudios.com
Thief1987 said:
And? Crash 4 developed by another studio.
Click to expand...

True, but VV and Toys for Bob were seemingly very close and collaborative studios. They often worked on one of the other's projects (with ports or development assistance or trading off on games in the Skylanders line.) Although it was weird that VV wasn't given the Crash sequel after doing the successful remaster, it seemed to work out for the best since VV got on THPS (IMO the better project, and very befitting VV finally getting the chance after so many Tony Hawk side-games that it'd carry on for the defunct Neversoft) and Toys did Crash 4. But now VV is out of the picture, and we'll see what happens but this feels like a dark omen for Toys for Bob as well.
 
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O

onnextflix5

Member
They dont care, if games are well received, if it don't sell lots, they shut it down, say goodbye to crash for another 10 years, i will boycott them from now.
 
Barakov

Barakov

Gold Member
Not the best news. Hopefully, they're working on Overwatch. Because, holy shit, that game needs some life injected back into it.
 
Dazraell

Dazraell

Member
I don't think it's a good news at all. Vicarious Visions did wonders with Crash games and a recent Tony Hawk remake, not to speak about their past projects. Merging them with Blizzard is a same waste of talent like what Activision did with pushing Raven Software to supporting development of Call of Duty games.

That said, this move may actually confirm rumors that Vicarious Visions was working on Diablo II remaster.
 
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Y

YCoCg

Member
This is sad, Tony Hawk's 1+2 did great and got some amazing reviews, and a lot of people would happily buy it again when it's released on Steam, but now that seems up in the air.

Considering we still don't have CTR or Crash 4 on PC, Activision really are the damn monkey's paw .
 
AV

AV

We ain't outta here in ten minutes, we won't need no rocket to fly through space
The optimist in me hopes that the VV devs will really breathe some new life into the husk of Blizzard. The optimist in me is also an idiot.

Fuck Activision.
 
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