Iconic Studio Codemasters Is Safe Following Closure Rumour

Sad that one of the few key developers on the Amiga to survive, is EA.

I growing up wanting to make games. I took a different path, but still would have loved to be a game developer. I wonder what kids in the know are thinking these days…? Choosing game developer as a career is becoming a very risky proposition.. 😥

Sad... I was playing Dizzy on my Amstrad C 6128 by Codemasters back in 90s...

That will be sad, I have had so many good games on my C64 from Codemasters including my most favourite game on there:

Which i believe was ported to NES

Everything touched by EA will be tarnished.
The greed of Western people of CEO expecting money come to company by minimalist and lazy effort and when the sales didn't reach the target, they just fired all those employees.
Such an evil human being.
The CEO of EA should be punished and get fired for ruining the gaming industry.
Also, guys.
EA now is Everything Abysmal.

A game studio that was once one of the biggest in the U.K. during the ZX Spectrum days of the 80s, now being closed down after a £1 billion acquisition just a few years back. What an absolute joke. And really depressing to read.

This is just insane, 4 years after acquisition! If they'll destroy Codies then I'll never, ever buy anything that will be published by EA. I'm with Codies since C64, they made so many good games during all those years...

I feel increasingly compelled to ask how many VG industry executives in current employment even boast a matching education as opposed to "shell games and financial pyramids for dummies". And whether the entire concept of public trading may have been a mistake.👀

@Bunkerneath Maybe now is a good time to push The Oliver Twins to acquire the Dizzy IP and release a collection.

Perhaps EA should’ve allowed Codemasters to put games on the Switch as I think they would’ve been much more profitable

Correction: WARNER killed Monolith

This acquisition was such a mismatch for EA, who only saw them for their F1 license and impulsively bought them because so many other studios were getting acquired at the same time. Now one of the most storied developers in Europe will be reduced to nothing

@FragRed It would be about time for this. Look at System 3, they had a Kickstarter campaign and are releasing Last Ninja + IK + Bangkok Knights games collection very soon, even as physicals on Switch and other consoles.

@KociolekDoSyta The Oliver Twins already part own all their IP that were released through Codemasters. It was the agreement they came to after the falling out in 91/92? So they are in a strong position.

So sad to see codemasters go
All big company's are shouting down developers coff coof Microsoft and now ea theres going to be no new games at this rate
It looks like Microsoft and ea and some others are trying to destroy the gaming industry 😢

@FragRed Yes and this would be the perfect time to release a collection. Maybe we'll finally get it, I really hope so!

So sad! For many of us in the UK Dizzy was like our Mario in the 80s. The Commodore 64 and Spectrum were bigger than the NES here.

The worst thing about it is Codemasters were a budget developer back then. I buying loads of their games as a kid as we didn't have a lot of money then. The antithesis of EA and all they stand for.

@Bunkerneath Yeah it's not even just Dizzy... aside from that I'd love a Commodore 64 Codemasters collection with stuff like CJ's Elephant Antics, BMX Simulator, Stuntman Seymour, DJ Puff's Volcanic Capers, Vampire, Robin Hood and other games on it.

It makes me so sad to think of all these games being locked away under EA forever!

And so it would seem another studio bought by EA ends up dead in their basement... Sad times.

Get bought by EA, get closed down. It's what they do to every developer they touch. I expected as much when they bought Codemasters. So sad to see.

@KociolekDoSyta What I don't get is they've already released collections on Evercade and Antstream Arcade has also had Dizzy games on it. Why not put them on the main consoles, even if it's just digitally?

They never made a game that was not at least very good

this industry is a joke

at least it dragged the panther down with it

@Suketoudara Think they all got delisted when EA bought Codemasters. The Oliver Twins one and Codemasters vol 1 on Evercade were delisted for certain despite plans for more volumes. So I can only guess EA put a stop to these plans.

Kinda saw this coming with that talk last week about the possibility of F1 on the NS2.

EA: because you just can’t have nice things.

@Suketoudara On top of that they were NES versions. I dream about a collection with all the Dizzy games from all the platforms. This just has to happen in the near future. I have no idea what kind of deal they made with Blaze to make this happen actually.

@Anti-Matter I think it is short sighted and rude to think just "western people" are greedy or to make a blanket statement that encomes a whole group of people. I understand English isn't your first language, but EA is an individual business and not a representation of western people as a whole. I'd be fine with your statement if you said EA seems greedy.

It's not even half time for 2025.. Feels like 2024 but even worse

VideogameIndustry: "How can we be even worse this year?"

@rvcolem1
EA, Ubisoft, ActiBlizzard.
Anti is not wrong.

If you wanna push it, many consider Sony kinda american too nowadays.

@KociolekDoSyta Emulating systems like ZX Spectrum, Amstrad C, C64 and Amiga are licensing problems because they’re still trademarked whereas NES and Mega Drive aren’t from an emulation standpoint.

Bee-lined to this to find my Amiga and Dizzy brethren.

Sucks to see them go. Had fun with Grid and some of the Dirt games.

I'm not surprised by this at all. To be honest, I thought this would happen the moment EA sunk their claws into them - you could see it coming a mile off. They just destroy everything they touch.

Who needs the Grim Reaper when the world has EA?

So. So. So. Stupid. (if true)

Codemasters were a varied and very talented group in the 80's and 90's but they also did the sensible thing and specialised into a developer of high end racing/driving games. A publishing partner with any sense would know how to develop the market for that style of game. Or how to adjust their output in a way that makes use of their highly specialised skill set.

But this is EA...

@KociolekDoSyta There was a Mega Drive version of Fantastic Dizzy too. It was really good!

In a Fantasy World (Dizzy) I'd love to have the NES and Mega Drive ones on Nintendo Switch Online so more people could experience them

@KociolekDoSyta I was really disappointed that the re-release of Rodland doesn't have the Amiga soundtrack. I hope any future Dizzy pack has, as you say, all the variants of each game (like Aladdin, Jungle Book & Lion King pack) and at the very least the different soundtracks.

@FragRed Thing is there is a Dizzy Collection on the Evercade https://evercade.co.uk/cartridges/the-oliver-twins-collection/
Also theres a Codemasters collection.
Damn how could i forget about Cannon Fodder!!!!

@FragRed Oh I had completely no idea about this, thank you! I owned C64 for a long time and these versions of games are the closest one to me.

@Suketoudara I played all of them, emulated tho. I would really like to finally give them my money. The problem is that I can't...

@JumpingJackson A friend of mine has this re-relase, I love this game! This should be possible, you know, nothing's impossible if you really want something. They're important and great titles and should be released, even at least as digitals.

It was clear EA just bought them to get the F1 license. Now they've made Codies into a shell of a company all that's left is to finish the job and (if they want to keep the license) transfer it to other studios in the wider group.

@Bunkerneath I think they are listed as “legacy” which if it’s the same meaning as their “legacy” hardware means they are no longer being produced. Perhaps old unsold stock exists but I was under the impression they’re no longer going to be sold.

Okay... I'll give them 100 dollars for the rights to Linus Spacehead and Dizzy in perpetuity.

Hope they take me up on the offer.

everyone knows that buying up studios and then shutting them down a few years later is what separates a brilliant business mind from an amateur.

@Duncanballs

EA Killed off more key developers from AMIGA.
Bullfrog, Westwood, Maxis and more.
Bullfrog are still my favorite studio ever as they made unique innovative games.
Populous, Syndicate, Powermonger, Theme Park, Dungeon Keeper, Magic Carpet and more.

I still own all Bullfrog physicals from AMIGA and PC with paper manuals etc. I also own all Maxis physicals from AMIGA and PC, except for anything with "The Sims".

Innovative Maxis were my second favorite.

Maxis are still alive, but still died 25 years ago.
Ignoring Spore, Maxis more or less made The Sims for 25 years.
So yes, EA killed off Maxis too.

@ear_wig If children are ionate enough, they'll still go for it. It’s like animation. Thanks to the internet, people know what to expect. It’s unstable and cutthroat. Doesn't stop people from wanting to make cartoons.

@Bunkerneath Yep, they are legendary.

I can't understand why anyone would wanna be bought by EA.
Everyone should already know that they will get shut down.

There are so many other publishers to choose from that don't shut down developers left and right.

Shutting down Codemasters will make EA reputation worse again.

Thats disgusting, codemasters is a legendary developer over the past decades. Why buy a studio and then just shut it down a few years later, crying shame. Should have left well alone.

EA is not the only company doing this, ultimately the problem is Neoliberalism.

In latest news:

EA just shut down Cliffhanger Games, but no one will miss them anyway if you have seen what they said in public.

They skipping the Nintendo Switch was their biggest mistake. You got a platform with the largest install base which remains active for 8 years and you just going to ignore that massive audience. I could see why they are going under soon and I'm not too sadden at all. These guys did it to themselves.

They went from being one of that last British publishers to have survived since the 8-Bit micro days to being arguably one of the most consistent racing game publishers for the past decade of so to being just another EA studio. Also the last game from them on Nintendo console was Grid Autosport on the Switch in 2019.

Not at all a surprise, as modern EA hates video games and those who play them. But Codemasters has also been kind of restricted by them, so I wonder if some of the devs will escape and form a new company that's more like the old Codemasters. It could happen!

@Serpenterror
The reason why most AAA developers skipped Switch, were because it used a media box chip from year 2014.

The chip were designed for 4K/60 video streaming, not gaming.

It's Nintendo's fault for not putting a chip dedicated for games in Switch.
When you put a video chip inside a console, you will miss out on most AAA games.

Blame Nintendo, not Codemasters.

wow what a disaster, obviously they saw the money that EA offered and took the bait.

It would have been better to sell to someone like Sega for less.
How wonderful it would have been to have a Codemasters new updates of Sega Rally, Daytona, Manx, and the like.

this reminds me of the terrible loss of Bizarre Creations who got bought by Activision back in the day,
they where another great Racing game studio, with the likes of F1 games, MSR, Project Gotham and there last game Blur.

Its crazy the greatest most legendary British games studios, all ruined by American acquisition.
Another part of gaming soul dies by greed.

@Toastmaster that's a mighty fine list of developers sadly gone.

Once EA bought them up, their days were numbered. They have a reputation of snatching up studios and closing them down in the future. I hope those affected land on their feet somewhere else. The game industry is brutal. Prices are skyrocketing but people are still being let go. Meanwhile the CEOs are raking in the cash and bonuses.😐

Still got my Prince of the Yolkfolk sat on my shelf in all its glory. Thanks for all the great memories Codemasters.

Could they choose to sell it or is there no buyers?

Loved BMX Simulator on the Spectrum back in '86...

@Bunkerneath Of all the Dizzy games, you must enjoy a challenge! One life even in the NES version. I'd go for Magic Land or Prince of Yolfolk, but all great games.

Codemasters were great, always affordable little tape games you could pick up and some excellent titles. Shame to see the brand go, I do have the Oliver Twins Evercade cart.

It's a shame that many greats from the Spectrum, C64 and Amiga days do not get more compilations.

I have the C64 Maxi, The Spectrum and patiently waiting for the A1200 Maxi ...... Didn't get the A500 mini as I wanted a working keyboard, system etc.

Wouldn't mind a Codemasters classics compilation on Switch though.

Very sad but not surprising. Whenever a giant company consumes a smaller company, it almost always results in layoffs, change in creative direction, and shutdown.

Big Nose the Caveman, developed on the NES by CodeMasters, is an Amazing game that not many people know about and the music is incredible.

Whilst I appreciate it’s cheaper to close than down, publishers should instead spin off acquisitions back into independent developers and set them free.

If anything the heads of a studio should require this as an acquisition clause.

@ArcadeRacingCENTRAL Well they do say an EA spokesperson has gotten in touch with them so I don't imagine it was on social media and probably by some other means.

Safe!
For now ....

With EA, The question is not why or how, but when.

How many times have we heard an exec or "spokesperson" say "______ is totally untrue and/or inaccurate" only to have that very thing confirmed hours or days later?