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Obsidian Entertainment history
Obsidian Entertainment company history timeline
The partnership between the two companies finalized in late 2003, and development of the game, which became Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, began in October 2003.
Obsidian itself was founded in 2003 by Feargus Urquhart, Chris Avellone, Chris Parker, Darren Monahan, and Chris Jones.
As of July 2004, it had expanded to 27, with 18 from Black Isle, and others from Blizzard Entertainment, Electronic Arts, Taldren, Totally Games, Treyarch, and Troika.
Development of the game began in July 2005 with a team of ten people.
The game was originally called Fury, whose concept was created in 2006, and is set in "a world that had been laid waste by a magical apocalypse". The concept later became Defiance, whose concept is similar to that of Tyranny.
In February 2009, Obsidian sent a prototype to Sega.
In October 2009, Obsidian was contacted by South Park Digital Studios to develop a game set within the South Park universe.
On February 11, 2010, Red Eagle Games and Obsidian announced that they would co-develop one or more games based on The Wheel of Time fantasy novel series by Robert Jordan.
The game received mixed reviews upon release in 2011, but it enjoyed a stable launch.
In 2011, the company began working on a third-person open world game named "Stormlands". It was rumored that the game was being produced for the then-unannounced successor to the Xbox 360.
Shortly after THQ took over, they entered into a financial crisis, eventually going bankrupt in late 2011.
In 2011, Viacom decided to let the video game publisher THQ take over as the game's publisher.
The Kickstarter campaign for Pillars of Eternity was launched in September 2012 under the working name "Project Eternity", with Obsidian requesting $1.1 million.
Eventually Ubisoft acquired the game, which was released as South Park: The Stick of Truth in March 2014.
On April 25, 2014, however, Urquhart told Computer & Video Games that the agreement between the companies had dissolved after Red Eagle had failed to secure the necessary funding.
In mid 2014, the studio announced Armored Warfare, a tank game developed for My.com.
A board game for Pillars of Eternity titled Pillars of Eternity: Lords of the Eastern Reach was announced on May 19, 2015.
In June 2015, studio co-founder Chris Avellone announced his departure from Obsidian.
After the release of New Vegas, there is also a desire to work on another Fallout game. It was announced in July 2015 that the company was working on the localization for Skyforge.
With THQ unable to continue its publishing and funding roles, an auction was held for other publishers to acquire their titles. It launched in open beta during 2015.
On March 15, 2016, Obsidian announced their new project called Tyranny, an isometric RPG set in a world where evil has already won.
In April 2016, Leonard Boyarsky joined Obsidian, becoming the second Troika Games co-founder to work for the company.
The game was announced for release in 2016 on Microsoft Windows, Mac and Linux, and was published by Paradox Interactive.
On January 27, 2017, Obsidian announced Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire and launched a crowdfunding campaign on Fig to raise additional development funds.
The project achieved its funding goal in less than a day, and was released in May 2018.
Obsidian announced that it had been acquired by Microsoft on November 10th, 2018.
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Obsidian Entertainment competitors
| Company name | Founded date | Revenue | Employee size | Job openings |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2k | - | $7.5M | 3,000 | 74 |
| SouthPeak Interactive CORP | 1996 | - | 50 | - |
| Epic Games | 1991 | $500.0M | 1,001 | 95 |
| Gearbox Software | 1999 | $45.4M | 550 | 16 |
| Tripwire | 1997 | $86.2M | 400 | 1 |
| Insomniac Games | 1994 | $17.5M | 401 | - |
| ArenaNet | 2000 | $111.0M | 400 | 6 |
| Naughty Dog | 1986 | $3.0M | 497 | 16 |
| Infostretch | 2004 | $42.0M | 20 | - |
| ChaiOne | 2008 | $3.4M | 70 | - |
Obsidian Entertainment history FAQs
Zippia gives an in-depth look into the details of Obsidian Entertainment, including salaries, political affiliations, employee data, and more, in order to inform job seekers about Obsidian Entertainment. The employee data is based on information from people who have self-reported their past or current employments at Obsidian Entertainment. The data on this page is also based on data sources collected from public and open data sources on the Internet and other locations, as well as proprietary data we licensed from other companies. Sources of data may include, but are not limited to, the BLS, company filings, estimates based on those filings, H1B filings, and other public and private datasets. While we have made attempts to ensure that the information displayed are correct, Zippia is not responsible for any errors or omissions or for the results obtained from the use of this information. None of the information on this page has been provided or approved by Obsidian Entertainment. The data presented on this page does not represent the view of Obsidian Entertainment and its employees or that of Zippia.
Obsidian Entertainment may also be known as or be related to Obsidian Entertainment Inc., Obsidian Entertainment and Obsidian Entertainment, Inc.