Raven Software confirms staff cuts

Written on August 27, 2009 at 5:08 pm, by James Fudge

Raven Software and studio owner Activision have confirmed with Shacknews that it has cut 30 – 50+ employees from its development studio in the post-development period following the release of X-Men Origins: Wolverine and Wolfenstein. While this is typical behavior for studios who finish up big projects and have nothing to keep its employees busy there has been some speculation that the layoffs may be the result of lackluster Wolfenstein sales. Tom Chick’s Wolfenstein review may have the answers to those questions – to say he felt the game was lacking would be a major understatement.

Currently the company is working on Singularity, with Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 set to ship on multiple platforms very soon.

Activision Tops in 2008

Written on February 12, 2009 at 12:48 am, by James Fudge

 Activision Blizzard posted a net loss for the fourth quarter, but the good news is that most of it was due to accounting rules for deferred revenue. The company did manage to beat the street’s expectations on sales of World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, Guitar Hero: World Tour, and Call of Duty: World at War, which were strong performers during the Christmas shopping season. For the quarter that ended on Dec. 31, 2008, Activision reported a net loss of $72 million, compared to earnings of $86 million, for the same period a year ago.

Activision CEO Bobby Kotick said during the earnings call that followed  that 2008 was the company’s 17th consecutive year of growth and that operating income was up 20 percent from the previous year.  Activision ended the year with $3 billion in cash and no debt.

The company also said that it would only be introducing three new original IPs in 2009:  Raven’s first-person shooter Singularity, an unnamed racing game from Bizarre Creations and Prototype. The rest of the company’s catalog will consist of familiar brands like Guitar Hero, and the next Call of Duty game. The company said that 2009 won’t see a new James Bond game – with talk of this new game being some type of driving – shooting game. Finally it was revealed that Blizzard will release at one title this year, though what it will be was not revealed.