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Factor 5's U.S. studio is no more

  • Posted May 15th, 2009 at 10:56 EDT by Mike Harradence
  • 25 Comments

California-based studio Factor 5 has officially closed its doors, CEO Achim Moller said in a statement on the company’s website yesterday. The studio was reported to have folded last December, though this was never confirmed.

The developer, best known for their work on the critically acclaimed Rogue Squadron series and PlayStation 3 exclusive Dragon romp Lair, closed shop due to financial repercussions bought on by Brash Entertainment filing for bankruptcy late last year. Factor 5 had previously signed a publishing deal with Brash in March 2008.

"We are sorry to announce the closure of the San Rafael-based Factor 5, Inc. studio, but the obstacles created by the sudden bankruptcy of Brash Entertainment for the continuation of operations have turned out to be too great to overcome in the current economic climate," said Moller.

The studio was originally founded in Cologne, Germany in 1987 by five former Rainbow Arts employees, before relocating to San Rafael, California USA in 1994.

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  1. Acid-Hippie2007

    • 6:05am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    Lair sucked anyways...

  2. O_G_H

    • 6:25am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    Wow.  People are so negative.  If you guys even fathomed the big picture.  You'd know that you should be saddened by this.  And Lair wasn't even that bad.  It died because of PS3 negative hype.  If it came out today, It would be a solid 8.0.  People were still "Sour Graping" the PS3 because of the $600 price tag back then.

  3. bobtheduck

    • 6:25am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    I wasted money on Lair, they went out of business... We're even now

     

    Ok, that's really mean. I wish the team well as they look for work in other companies. I hope they learn from their experience and bring something with them to the new teams they join.  It would suck to lose a job, I really was just joking...

  4. posingparrot

    • 6:27am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    NIce one Acid-Hippie2007

    As someone that has close links to the gaming world, and has friends that face unemployment because of similar reasons - its good to see that your comment of "Lair sucked anyways" is a great representation of the current economic climate and am sure that all the staff of Factor 5 appreciate your concerns for their personal futures and that of their families.  Nice one . . .

  5. O_G_H

    • 6:41am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    That's what I'm sayin'...kids.

  6. Smithy2306

    • 7:00am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    Lot of idiots in these comment sections.  Looking at you #1

  7. RustySpoon80

    • 7:17am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    But Factor 5 made the excellent Rogue Squadron games on the GameCube. They will be missed.

  8. FireSol

    • 7:39am EDT - May 15th, 2009

     #3

    then why M$ still alive???

    with you logic they must went out of business years ago

  9. DaLi6

    • 7:56am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    ONLY IDIOTS AND WUSSES WOULD SAY LAIR S,,,,, like this piggy pig in ign who reviewed and gave it a bad review just because it was the first game most realistic way to fly a dragon i never had any prob with that game i enjoyed it so much i don't know why idiots would wanna play an awesome game and comment by saying that they should have (goo goo gaga) pad control instead of sixaxis, grow up !!!

    they were working on an awesome game for ps3 and it was exclusive !!! damn well i hope some miracle occure for them to reopen and continue the project

  10. Javonne

    • 8:09am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    I feel bad for them, I mean Lair was'nt the best game out there but I still liked it though.

    @3

    Just because they made one game that didn't interest a whole bunch of people or you, it doesn't mean you should bash them for trying something new.

  11. posas

    • 8:13am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    One of the greatest developers ever!  I was a fan ever since I bought and played the first Rogue squadron game for the Nintendo 64, and I bought the GameCube because Factor 5 was exclusively supporting it.  I was excited when Factor 5 announced they would exclusively support the PlayStation 3. 

    Best wishes.

     You will be missed.

  12. xVxSMOKExVx

    • 10:09am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    I wonder why Sony didn't offer to buy them up to add to our team of first party devs.  Give them all those resources, and most importantly money.  I bet they would have been a great for more of PS3 top notch exclusives. 

  13. NeauxFear

    • 10:22am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    @    2... too true O_G_H, too true. I've played lair and I didn't think it was that bad, and that was before the patch came out.

  14. west_end_matt

    • 10:26am EDT - May 15th, 2009

     There's no way Lair would've been an 8 if released today. maybe a 4 if you're lucky. It was a bad game that didn't work period.

  15. Skyesapaart

    • 11:21am EDT - May 15th, 2009

    All idiots above, yeah everyone has own opinion of games, but if studios keep closing down you wont have any games. This is getting really bad, how many studios we gonna see fold :(

  16. KZ3000

    • 2:04pm EDT - May 15th, 2009

    3D Realms was 9999x times better producer than Factor 5 and they shut down too.

    This is not fair , 3D Realms should never shut down.

    Duke Nukem Forever were going to be beat the crap out of any FPS game

  17. Acid-Hippie2007

    • 2:54pm EDT - May 15th, 2009

    Wow, whats with the name calling, how old are you guys?

  18. Seb

    • 3:08pm EDT - May 15th, 2009

    Lair wasn't a bad game. They just made a critical error in choosing to support the Six-Axis controller.  At the time Sony had to come up with something to replace the void left by the Dual Shocks disappearance. It wouldn't surprise me at all if it turns out that they pressured Factor 5 into supporting the damn thing even though they knew it was terrible.  At the end of the day if it had been d-pad only I think it would have been a fantastic game, but the six axis killed it.

  19. Free_Agent

    • 3:49pm EDT - May 15th, 2009

     This is a bummer, I never like seeing studios going belly up after 1 bad launch. The problem was obviously the six-axis BS that Sony tried to throw in as a last minute decsion, and then force developers to try and use it effectively. The game wasn't that great, but was much better with just the analog sticks, too little too late though. This is also why developers aren't developing exclusively for the PS3 anymore, it cost's way too much, and gamble just isn't worth it, especially with how Bi**y and moany the PS3 user base is. No wonder everyone is going multi-platform. 

  20. tgf5

    • 3:59pm EDT - May 15th, 2009

    People that say Lair sucked, just sucked at the controls or barely played the game.

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Related information

  • Related game: Lair

    Release date (US):
    September 4th, 2007
    Developer:
    Factor 5
    Genre:
    Action - Third Person
    Rank:
    45 of 2,395 Games
    Up 0 places (in last 7 days)

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