Trouble at Infinity Ward, Senior Employees Fired!

[GTFO. Luckyg]

G4tv.com's Patrick Klepek is reporting that a "tense" situation is brewing at Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 developer Infinity Ward. Citing a "source close to the... developer", Patrick paints a picture of what could be going on between IW and publisher Activision Blizzard.

According to the story, "Infinity Ward studio heads Vince Zampella and Jason West reportedly met with Activision this morning and have not been seen by Infinity Ward staff members since."

Later in the day, non-uniformed "bouncers" arrived at Infinity Ward, but would not explain why they were there.

No official word has been released by either company at this time, but we'll keep you updated with any developments.

Update: Earlier today, Activision filed an SEC report that mentioned Activision looking into "breaches of contract and insubordination by two senior employees at Infinity Ward." The filing also states that "this matter is expected to involve the departure of key personnel and litigation."

Additionally, a post on Facebook by Jason West, confirmed to be legitimate, mentions being newly unemployed. West has also updated his LinkedIn profile with a March 2010 end-date for his position at IW.

WTF! thats all I can say

UPDATE!

Studio head Vince Zampella has likewise confirmed a March 2010 departure from Infinity Ward via LinkedIn.

[GTFO. CrooZin]

Lolz, thats what you get for bringing in some shitty match making system that fails bigtime!

[r3loaded]

Maybe the bosses at Activision played BFBC2 and saw how good it was?

Btw, I'm suddenly seeing ads for that game all over London, including one on the big screen at Euston station. They're really going all-out on the marketing on this one!

[fraginator3000]

Hah probably and how they all gonna start playing that...

RIP MW2...RISE BFBC2

[GTFO. Luckyg]

bit of an update fresh today from cvg,

In what's surely one of the biggest megatons of the year so far, fired Infinity Ward heads Jason West and Vince Zampella have announced the formation of a new development studio, Respawn Entertainment in partnership with EA.

The Call of Duty co-creators have signed up with EA Partners for exclusive worldwide publishing and distribution rights for thier future games.

In a sly dig at Activision, the new studio promises to position its leadership team as "the owners of the intellectual property they create".

The company will focus on "creating state-of-the-art gaming experiences for global audiences," it says, adding that it's currently assembling "a world-class team of designers, artists and engineers" and applicants can submit resumes to jobs@respawn.com.

It's not yet clear if other ex-Infinity Ward employees, including lead designer, Todd Alderman and lead software engineer, Francesco Gigliotti, will be joining Respawn.

"Respawn Entertainment marks a fresh start for Jason and me," said Vince Zampella, who'll act as general manager.

"For the past decade we led a great development team and poured our hearts into creating an epic game franchise. We're very proud of what we built - and proud that so many millions of fans enjoyed those games. Today we hope to do it all over again -- open a new studio, hire a great team, and create brand new games with a new partner, EA."

West added: "We're excited. Now that the team is in control of the games and brands, we can ensure that the fans are treated as well as they deserve."

Frank Gibeau, President of the EA Games Label commented, "This is the start of a great publishing partnership - one that I expect will develop blockbuster game franchises. Jason and Vince are two of the top creative leaders in the entertainment industry. At EA, we're honored to be their partners and to give them the support they need to hire a team and return to making incredible games."

The two Infinity Ward founders were fired and removed from the Infinity Ward premises earlier this year after Activision security "stormed the offices".

Soon after the pair launched a lawsuit against their former employer for US$36 million and control over the Modern Warfare franchise.

[diz]

Didn't Infinity Ward employees work on Medal of Honor for EA before they created IW and Call of Duty series?

-diz

[GTFO. Luckyg]

Didn't Infinity Ward employees work on Medal of Honor for EA before they created IW and Call of Duty series?

-diz

aye.

[GTFO. Coxy]

So why were they fired to start with? And who's the good guys? Activision or them??

Confused

[GTFO. NachoDuck]

So why were they fired to start with? And who's the good guys? Activision or them??

Confused

If you want to read through all the details of the ongoing lawsuits, there's a big read here - http://kotaku.com/5513756/the-biggest-b ... e=true&s=i

It's a long story with accusations from both sides from what I can remember reading from that article.

[DataStorm]

still find the claim bit strange....

cos the CEO is just directing the company.... sure he/she can bring in idea's, but most time its the ppl actually making stuff coming up with most of it....

[GTFO. Irritant]

With games developers, more often than not the CEOs are more often than not programmers, as they tend to start off as very small companies of about 4 people led by a programmer.

As the company gets bigger, the CEO has less time for programming but that is their background and they are always involved in the design (particularly technical design) of their products.

[Sepp]

IW employees strike back: http://g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/70427 ... stage.html

Haha...and just a few days before a statement from activision: "We treat our developers extremely well."
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/enterta ... wsuit.html