Respawn Entertainment, the developer behind the Titanfall series and founded by Vince Zampella, has officially been acquired by Electronic Arts. In an announcement on the official Respawn Blog, Zampella stated that EA has been a "great development partner that supports us and doesn't interfere with our process for making games or studio culture."
EA will provide us with more resources, access to new technologies, and expertise that we can tap into to that will help us make better games, and Respawn will retain the same creative freedom and culture we’ve always had. - Zampella
Zampella also noted that no one from the studio will suffer layoffs from the acquisition, and no major shakeups in the studio's current development projects, including the untitled Star Wars Game and Titanfall 3, will be changed. Zampella himself will now be part of the studio leadership team at EA while retaining his position as studio head at Respawn.
In total, EA will be spending over $455 million on Respawn Entertainment; $315 million in cash and stock and a Metacritic-tied bonus of around $140 million for the two current games in development.
We heard about EA buying Respawn last week but didn't want to report it until we were 100% sure. The contract, which I've seen, includes Metacritic-tied bonuses for Titanfall 3 and Star Wars.
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) November 9, 2017
Journalist Jason Schreier also reported extra information on the acquisition, noting that EA outbid South Korean video game publisher Nexon for the studio. News of the deal was apparently known since early last week but was only finalized today by the public announcement by Zampella.
Schreier also noted a timeline regarding the events surrounding EA and Visceral games, which was shut down last month due to major conflicts of interest with studio lead Amy Henning and a lack of direction for an already in production Star Wars title, among other problems as per Schreier. It should be noted that Schreier is not stating that the two events are officially linked, but is merely pointing out the timeline of events regarding the situation with Visceral and Respawn over the past month.
Sequence of events:
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) November 9, 2017
1) Nexon makes offer for Respawn, per documentation sent to Kotaku
2) EA has first right of refusal, per documentation, and can make an offer
3) EA shuts down Visceral Games
4) EA announces that it has bought Respawn
Respawn Entertainment was founded by Zampella and Jason West in 2010. Both Zampella and West were the original founders of Infinity Ward, the developers behind the Call of Duty franchise, but were forcibly removed from the studio by Activision in March of 2010 for "insubordination." West and Zampella sued Activision, who filed a counter-suit to the two before both sides reached an undisclosed settlement in 2012.
What are your thoughts on all of this? is EA a good fit for Respawn? Leave your comments below.
