Flagship Studios: It's worse than that; he's dead, Jim

by Akela Talamasca Jul 12th 2008 at 9:30PM

Filed under: Fantasy, Business models, MMO industry, News items, Hellgate: London, Mythos, Free-to-play

Although our previous coverage of Flagship Studios -- creators of Mythos and Hellgate: London -- mentioned that a large, undisclosed portion of the staff were laid off, it was only today that we discovered the true extent of the damage. Our mothership site Joystiq has posted the news that the entirety of the team has been fired with 30-day pensions.

So what's going to happen to Hellgate and Mythos? Despite their earlier denial, there is some truth to the Hanbitsoft rumor, except that they'll be receiving the IP rights to Mythos instead of Hellgate, as was previously said. Hellgate will go to Dallas-based Comerica, a financial services company. Hanbitsoft, being a Korean game company, and distributor of the Starcraft license in Korea, might choose to keep Mythos alive, but who knows what Comerica will do with Hellgate? As of this writing, neither title's official sites have posted any information about Flagship's closure. We'll bring you news on the fate of these two titles as soon as we know anything ourselves.

Tags: breaking, comerica, fired, flagship-studios, hanbitsoft, hellgate-london, mythos

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Dass said on 10:26PM 7-12-2008

RIP Flagship RIP Mythos (or a move to pay a month model).

Died Hellgate Died this game is one of the worst wanabe Massively games I ever played.

PurityKnight said on 12:24AM 7-13-2008

Unfortunately that turd called Hellgate was complete unpolishable. It was probably right to stick in a fork in it. I was looking forward to giving Flagship another shot with Mythos, and I applied for that beta. Oh well.

I wonder if Bill Roper and company regret their decision to leave Blizzard or if they are still happy to at least have tried to launch their own thing? Maybe a sense of unfinished business.

Ironically I remember Roper and them saying one of their reasons for leaving was the uncertainty of Blizzard's future before they knew WoW was gonna be a mega success. Now with the recent merger with Activision, the entire senior management team was locked up with long term deals that seem to have made everyone very happy.

I'll still follow what happens with the former Blizzard North guys I'd love to see them get a taste of glory again.

Bissrok said on 1:05AM 7-13-2008

I had fun with Hellgate's single player, though I never thought much of it. It'd be a shame if anything happened to Mythos, though. It's a fun game, even in beta. I'll follow it no matter where the game goes from here.

Rufus said on 2:54AM 7-13-2008

I'm still hoping this is some cruel rumour.

Mythos is the best free2play mmorpg ever, and who knows the direction it will take with Hanbitsoft? Hopefully they'll re-hire all of the flagship seattle (if this still unconfirmed news is true) lol. Because mythos just wouldn't be good anymore if it got turned into a korean grind.

ReijMan said on 3:53AM 7-13-2008

Mythos vs Diablo3 and Mythos already lost?

Ghen said on 7:52AM 7-13-2008

Its kinda eerie to hear news like this even though we've been asking for it.

Flagshipped.com said on 9:11AM 7-13-2008

Looks like dark days ahead for Hellgate: London players. Though nothing is certain until the official word and IP ownership is decided if a legal battle ends up coming into play.

http://www.flagshipped.com

Advantus said on 1:33PM 7-14-2008

It started a slow painful death when they went to that lousy Overworld in trying to make it a mini WOW but it ended up looking like Flyff. The game pre Overworld was great...all they had to do was add a few more classes...up the level limit and work on more zones. Such a shame.

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