Bizarre Creations Set to Close

Despite the apparent u-turn when news originally hit that Blur creator Bizarre Creations was not being closed but merely put up for sale by publisher Activision, it appears that the Liverpool-based studio will indeed shut its doors. The root of the decision is quoted as the lacklustre sales response to the developer’s new racing IP, Blur.

Activision Worldwide Studios’ chief operating officer Coddy Johnson has told Develop that, despite “exploring a lot of deals,” the developer will not continue to operate. He said:

Unfortunately so far we’ve not been able to find any interested parties. So we’ve made, as a last resort, a recommendation to the team for closure.

I want to be clear, our first choice was to try and keep this group together and find a buyer for the studio.

Regrettably for the 200 people at Bizarre, a buyer has not been found. Our thoughts go out to everyone affected by this decision.

Source: Develop

36 Comments

  1. That’s a real pity, Bizarre have been making games for yonks. Hope everyone involved manages to find something else quickly.

  2. Wonder what will happen to Bungie if there next game wasn’t to have many sales… :/

    Negative :(

    • Bungie aren’t owned by Acti, they’ve just signed a deal for Acti to publish their games

  3. It’s a shame as Blur wasn’t bad, it just got swamped at release and should have been held back a bit longer or released earlier.

    • I didn’t buy it due to the lack of steering wheel support, I can’t imagine its that much hard work to implement but so many racing games don’t support them its strange…

  4. Shame. Blur was a decent game.

  5. so it should close down, 007 Bloodstone was abysmal!

    • Like every 007….

    • And Project Gotham Racing 4 was bloody awesome. If every studio was shut down for making a poor game we’d have very few studios left!
      :)

    • Bit harsh. Regardless of the quality of their games there will be people wondering how they are going to put food on the table and keep a roof over their heads. Given their track record there must be a lot of talent at the studio and I hope the find something else quickly.

    • Dont be dick jamess109. Thats quite an insensitive comment. Bloodstone was actually not bad. It prob closed because Activision are very greedy and it didn’t make as much money as they wanted.

      • I agree – Bloodstone is actually a fairly decent outing for a James Bond title (as some have been really lacking) & not a bad first attempt. Shame they won’t get another crack of the whip really, as if they were given the chance to make another game, they could refine the experience & it could have been great.
        Dunno why Blur didn’t do so well to be honest, as it had a solid advertisement on TV around the time of release & is a great game. Never short of people online either from what i recall.
        Bloodstone however was not advertised at all & i actually picked it up a week or two after release for £20!

      • Just get Quantum Of Solace it’s at least 10.437 times better than Bloodstone

      • I found QoS to be rather boring… shoot shoot shoot, QTE, Shoot, “end game”, while I found BloodStone to be the 2nd Best 007 game, after EoN, and I love FPSs (note: I never played GoldenEye).BloodStone had a great story (the second “not movie based” best story for a 007 game, in my opinion, after EoN), solid gameplay, tense moments, you actually feel like 007 and not Random Soldier #7, the animations are exelent. Lightning and character models/texture were shit, though.
        BTW, CC, why 10.437 and not 10 or 10.5?

  6. “ill buy that for a dollar”
    (robocop quote)

  7. Activision gave Blur phenomenal support and didn’t register in people’s conciousness at the required mass market level.

    Bloodstone was bloody awful though and was probably very expensively licensed by Acti

    Activision have the stated aim to “Create, Acquire and Maintain Strong Brands” everyone who does business with them knows it and presumably if you produce content that doesn’t become a strong brand they won’t continue doing business with you. It is the nature of the beast.

    It’s sad a buyer couldn’t be found, but Bizarre has a talented team and I’m sure they could either form their own indie studio or take up vacancies within other companies. Good luck.

    • Could any of them Respawn else where do you think? Get your CV’s out there guys and best of luck!

  8. Activision paid 67 million for Bizarre Creations only 3 years ago, so although it’s sad news for BC, Activision are well out of pocket too – that’s a pretty big dent in your finanaces whatever way you look at it.

    • Time to release mount armour in Wow me thinks.

    • I suppose there is at least some good to come of this.

      Seriously though, gonna miss Bizarre Creations, there are too few original Xbox developers left. First “Indie Built” (Amped) then FASA (Crimson Skies) and now Bizarre. Not to mention Ensemble, while I don’t think they released any games for the original Xbox, they still deserve a mention for Age of Empires.

      *sigh*

  9. i bought blur recently haven’t finished it yet but i’m enjoying it. I didn’t buy it back when it was released because it was close to split second. Maybe it was Activisions fault for the timing of the release that led to poor sales and ultimatly the the closure of Bizarre creations. Good look to all those those at bizarre in finding new jobs

  10. Hopefully we can still get a Blur 2

    • Not sure how now unless its under a different studio!

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