disney-interactive-studios posts

Disney Interactive Studios suffered through some mass layoffs earlier this year that caused about 200 or so team members to lose their jobs along with the shutdown of one of its development teams, Propoganda Games. Now Paidcontent.org is reporting that another, smaller, wave of layoffs has hit the division.

According to the story, another 80 team members are now looking for work. Disney Interactive sent out a statement admitting to "targeted" layoffs. The story claims that this latest round will be the last as the division's new co-presidents, John Pleasants and Jimmy Pitaro, try to boost revenues at Disney Interactive.

Publisher Disney Interactive Studios has been going through a lot lately. The division of Disney shut down a major game development studio, Propaganda Games, earlier this month and this week a large amount of the company's team was laid off. Now comes word that there is a new person in charge of Disney's internal game studios.

The Los Angeles Times reports that Alex Seropian, who previously founded Bungie, will now oversee Disney Interactive's game development as well as be in charge of its many internal developers, including Junction Point Studios and Black Rock Studios. Seropian came into the Disney Interactive family when the division acquired Seropain's Wideload game development studio in 2009. Meanwhile the article claims that the many layoffs at Disney Interactive are just the first wave in a series. Disney Interactive's execs are looking to cut costs and that may mean more people could lose their jobs in the coming months.

Yet another major game developer with PC ties is closing its doors. Our sister site Joystiq confirmed today with publisher Disney Interactive Studios that it was closing its in-house development team at Vancouver-based Propaganda Games.

Formed in 2005, the developer only released two games, both of which were released to the PC platform; the 2008 first person shooter revival of the Turok franchise and Tron Evolution, the movie-based third person action game that was released just last December to poor reviews and sales. The writing was on the wall last fall when Disney Interactive cut half of the studio's staff and canceled another long-in-development game, Pirates of the Caribbean: Armada of the Damned.

As we get closer to the release of Tron Evolution, the movie-based third person action game is already prepping for extra downloadable content. IGN reports that the Propaganda Games-developed title will have a code in the retail game box that will enable players to download free extras when the game ships on December 7.

On that date, two new multiplayer maps (Codestream Nexus and User's Plaza) will be available for download via the retail code. That will increase the total number of multiplayer maps in the game from four to six levels. In addition the code will give folks a way to grab a new multiplayer skin that looks like Sam Flynn, the lead character of the upcoming movie Tron Legacy.That will be made available the week of December 13.

Lego Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game, the latest Lego-based game in the long-running franchise from developer TT Games, has just been announced by its publisher Disney Interactive. The game is due out in May 2011 for the PC and other platforms around the same time Disney releases the fourth movie in the hugely popular Pirates of the Caribbean series.

The game will incorporate storylines from all four movies as well as over 70 of the movie's characters as they explore and battle through 20 levels. Like most of the other Lego games, this new entry will also have support for two player co-op mode.

Disney Interactive recently decided to cancel plans to release the long-in-development RPG Pirates of the Caribbean: Armada of the Damned. The cancellation of that game also caused mass layoffs at its developer Propaganda Games.

It's not a good day at Propaganda Games. The Vancouver-based development studio owned by Disney Interactive is experiencing mass layoffs following the cancellation of one of the studio's two games, the movie-based RPG Pirates of the Caribbean: Armada of the Damned. The game was first announced back in May 2009 and was due for release sometime in 2011 until today's cancellation announcement.

According to Kotaku, as many as 100 people have been let go at Propaganda Games this week. While not stating exact numbers, Disney Interactive did confirm that the company's development teams have been consolidated from two teams to just one. The remaining team members are completing work on the upcoming Tron Evolution which is still scheduled to be released on December 7.

While Eidos Montreal is working hard on Deus Ex: Human Revolution, we could have had a spiritual successor to the first two games in the sci-fi RPG series from the man behind those classic games Warren Spector. In a new chat with the Develop web site Spector admits that he pitched such a game to the higher ups at Disney Interactive.

However he figured beforehand that the Disney execs wouldn't go for his game idea and he says, " ... I was right. The guys started texting in the middle of the meeting. I was convinced they were not interested." Instead Disney pitched an idea to Spector that eventually became his next game, the upcoming Wii exclusive Epic Mickey. However that sci-fi game idea might still happen in some form. Spector says, "Disney now owns the IP to it. So who knows – I certainly have ideas of how they would work in a Disney context."

The light cycles are getting closed to being revved up again. Publisher Disney Interactive has just announced that Tron Evolution, a prequel game to the upcoming film Tron Legacy, will ship for the PC and other platforms on December 7. That's just 10 days before Tron Legacy heads to movie theaters.

Our sister site Joystiq reports that Tron Evolution will be getting a Collector's Edition,. That edition will cost a whopping $139 and, among other things comes with a toy version of the movie's iconic light cycle. Unfortunately the Collector's Edition is only slated for the PS3 and Xbox 360 ports. At least PC gamers will be getting some Tron-based gaming mice and keyboards.

Encom's classic arcade game Space Paranoids looks like its going to make a big comeback in the next few days. A new web site from the corporation is showing a countdown that will reach zero on Thursday. From the looks of it the game is Space Paranoids Online, the long awaited revival of the . . .

What's that? Isn't this game fictional? Well maybe it was when it was featured in the 1980's film Tron but on Thursday, it looks like you will be able to combat the Recognizers in this web based game. It's all part of a extensive viral campaign for the upcoming movie Tron Legacy which comes out in December. There's already a retail PC game based on the movie that's due out this fall, Tron Evolution, that was announced several months ago.

We can't drive 55 (police, don't read this; we are just kidding . . hehe) and neither can the drivers in the upcoming action-racing game Split/Second. In the newest gameplay video footage from the game we get to see how the drivers competing in the fictional reality show tear up the downtown area of a big, if fictional, city.

Developer Blackrock Studios shows off a lot of property destruction in this clip as a tunnel is smashed by a helicopter lifting a massive dump truck and a bridge is taken down by several explosions. You can bet there's a lot more where that clip comes from when Split/Second ships on May 18.