Things aren’t looking so good for the famed TimeSplitter series developer, Free Radical. It has been confirmed today that the game developer is officially up for sale. The situation began shortly after Free Radical’s latest title (Haze – PS3) bombed in both reviews and sales. Combine the aftershock of a sorry game with the current global economy and you get layoffs, cutbacks and now a for sale sign.
Soon after the cutbacks began, a group of Free Radical’s top developers including David Doak and Steve Ellis broke away from the company to form UK developer, Pumpkin Beach. These key members have worked with Rare on previous AAA titles such as GoldenEye 007 and Perfect Dark.
Interestingly enough, the particular video game IPs available for sale have been reported to be the TimeSplitters franchise as well as several other mystery IPs which have been eyed by many gaming firms.
It was confirmed in July 2007 that TimeSplitters 4 was in deep development. Many rumors have also flared that Star Wars Battlefront III was in development by Free Radical.
Will these unfinished titles ever see the light of day?
Nintendo. Buy. Now. Timesplitters 4 exclusive to the Wii would be epic.
Doctor Doak worked on Perfect Dark? But I thought that Free Radical had already broken off from Rare to make the first Timesplitters by the time Rare had made Perfect Dark? I guess I’m wrong? Well I do know that they guys who did weapon design went to Free Radical. Compare the weapons. Goldeneye: You can dual wield rocket launchers and you reload instantly by simply lowering the gun off the screen. Timesplitters: the same. Perfect Dark: Realistically, you can only use one of a two handed weapon and you have take five GODDAMN minutes to load every chamber every time you want to reload a Magnum.
Why would Nintendo buy Free Radical? Didn’t their top people just LEAVE?
Why should they buy them? I mean they’d get a good price, but this is another lemon waiting to happen, like Rare.
I’ll give them a fine fat goose for it.
I hadn’t read about FR’s top people leaving… if that’s the case, let microsoft have ’em.
Actually, I think Nintendo should buy them (cheap). Then Nintendo could insert a few of their own people into top positions in the company, and start producing some great games (Wii exclusive), and make a huge profit – thus showing the rest of the video game world just how to do things the right way.
As long as TS4 comes out (with the same taste as the others) then I’m fine.