Lionhead Studios

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Lionhead Studios
Lionhead logo
Type	Video Game Developer
Founded	1997
Headquarters	United Kingdom
Key people	Peter Molyneux Dean Carter Simon Carter
Industry	computer and video game industry
Products	Video Games
Website	http://www.lionhead.com/

Lionhead Studios is a United Kingdom-based computer game development company led by industry veteran Peter Molyneux, and taken over by Microsoft Game Studios in April 2006.

Lionhead started as a breakaway from the developer Bullfrog, which was also founded by Molyneux, Lionhead's first game was Black & White, a god game with elements of artificial life, strategy, and beat 'em up games. Black & White was published by Electronic Arts in 2001. Lionhead Studios is named after a dead hamster of one of the original members. As they were discussing a name a few minutes before a rep from Electronic Arts arrived, the member went to check on his hamster, Lionhead, who was found dead.^{[citation needed]}

Black and White was followed up with the release of an expansion pack named "Black & White: Creature Isle." Lionhead then released the popular (and controversial) Fable, from satellite developer Big Blue Box. In 2005, Lionhead released The Movies and Black & White 2. On 6 April 2006, it was announced that Lionhead Studios was to be purchased by Microsoft to further bolster their range of Xbox 360 games.

Contents 1 Corporate Structure 2 Delays 3 Critical Reception 4 Games 4.1 Released 4.2 In development 4.3 Suspended 4.4 Cancelled 5 External links

[edit] Corporate Structure

For a period of three years, Lionhead set up a network of "satellite" developers, including Big Blue Box Studios (developers of Fable), Intrepid Games (developers of B.C., since suspended due to a massive overrun) and Black & White Studios (who have taken responsibility for the continuation of the Black & White series). Lionhead proper is working on three games, Fable 2, Dimitri, a simulation game of some sort (about which Lionhead is being unusually tight-lipped), and The Movies (a sims-like game based upon the premise of running your own movie studio).

However, during an interview with Computer and Video Games, on April 6th, 2005, Peter Molyneux revealed that "[Dimitri is] a game about (pause for dramatic drum roll) ...you. It allows anyone who plays the game to relive their life, their entire individual life. That's a pretty ambitious concept." While our [C&VG's] jaw dropped to the floor, Lionhead PR hastily intervened with the effect of a virtual gagging order.

This "satellite" system has ceased to exist in any meaningful form since mid-2004, however, with Big Blue Box having been more or less integrated into the main company, and Intrepid essentially having been disbanded. The company still maintains separate studios, but they are all now on one site in the Surrey Research Park.

Lionhead was a privately held company until October 2004 (shortly before the suspension of BC) when a consortium of investors, including Ingenious Ventures, IDG VE and technology firm Add Partners, made a significant investment into the developer. This at a time when the company was in severe financial straits, as they had over-run development on two projects, Black & White 2 and Fable, and also cancelled B.C. and a project with Jeff Minter named Unity.

However, since September 2005 Lionhead have successfully released two AAA titles, Black & White 2 and The Movies, as well as an updated version of Fable (entitled Fable: The Lost Chapters). To date, these titles have not achieved a massive impact in sales, and this left the company vulnerable to a takeover bid. They have only one game that is known of currently in development which is Fable 2. Nothing has been heard of Dimitri but Lionhead say they are currently working on two original titles that presumably is not expansion packs. This might include Black & White 3.

In April 2006 Lionhead Studios was acquired by Microsoft. Lionhead will be the part of Microsoft Game Studios, which also includes Rare Ltd. and Bungie Studios.

[edit] Delays

Lionhead has received a lot of media attention for their delayed games, in part due to the large amount of publicity and hype generated for their games. Various reports on this indicate a company tendency to re-design games mid-development and a tendency toward over-ambition, though few reports are official. The company is always on the cutting edge of developing new technology, especially in the area of NPC AI, which adds considerably to their development schedules. Peter Molyneux, the lead designer of Lionhead, often promises specific release dates early on in the development of his titles. This causes particular problems and disappointment among fans as many release dates are pushed back, sometimes more than once. Black and White missed several deadlines until it was finally released in 2001. A similar problem occurred with the release of The Movies which was intended for a 2004 release date but was eventually delayed to 2005.

[edit] Critical Reception

Lionhead have also acquired a love-hate relationship with its audience and the media. While game reviewers tend to be pre-disposed to giving their games high scores, fan communities tend to accuse the company's games of being all idea and no depth. Fable is the key example of this. Numerous magazines and online sources hailed the game, while other gamers looked at it with disappointment [1]. While the game had many innovative concepts contained within it, such as a morpheable player character, a morality system and the ability to interact with townsfolk, get married etc, a common reaction among players was to feel that none of these concepts really affected each other or added up to a complete game; that, or various concepts were already used in other games.

Likewise, Black & White 2 has been criticized as missing the mark.

However, The Movies has proved popular and reviews of the game have been very positive.

Also, Fable was considered very good by video game critics, after its release. Before it's release, it had many empty promises that Peter Molyneux promised, however much of those were scrapped or canned early in production due to settings the game required.

[edit] Games

[edit] Released

• Black & White (2001)
• Fable (2004)
• Fable: The Lost Chapters (2005)
• Black & White 2 (2005)
• The Movies (2005)
• The Movies: Stunts & Effects (2006)
• Black & White 2: Battle of the Gods (2006)

[edit] In development

• The Dimitri Project
• Fable 2

[edit] Suspended

• B.C.

[edit] Cancelled

• Unity

[edit] External links

• Lionhead Studios
• Official Lionhead news site
• Project Ego.net Lionhead Studios Info
• LionSource.com — top Lionhead community site (German)
• Lionhead Studios profile on MobyGames