News
Where Did They Go?
Cordova, TN; January 22, in the year of our Lord 2018--Family
Friendly Gaming, the industry leader in covering the family
friendly video games is asking a very important question. Where
did they go? You might be wonderful who I am talking about. Who
left? When did they leave? Are they coming back? Who am I
talking about? Is it someone you know? I am talking about video
game companies that go under. You know – belly up, bankrupt, and
out of business. I understand that when a company is going
bye-bye they are not really focusing on telling everyone they
will not be operating anymore. It is why some gaming journalists
constantly check the bankruptcy filings to try and find out who
is going under and when. Some companies just vanish. They may
never file. They might just close up shop with no notification
to anyone.
I had an interesting experience recently. A person in the PR
industry sent me a press release about Mad Catz coming back. I
did not know they had left. I knew THQ went belly up, and was
bought out by Nordic. I knew Mojang was sold to Microsoft. The
whole Mad Catz incident got me thinking. Why do video game
companies only focus on the positives? How are we supposed to
know when a company goes away? I recognize some of the signs. A
company stops sending out press releases. This does not mean
much though. GameMill Entertainment and Little Orbit went
extended periods without any transmissions to Family Friendly
Gaming. Then out of nowhere they released a few games again.
Sure the games from those two companies have been generally
lame. They have not updated Twitter or Facebook in years. They
still have websites and new games came from them. When the
website is gone it is pretty assured they are too.
I wish there was a better exit strategy for video game
companies. Why did they go under? What can be done to fix it?
Was it management? Was it leadership? Did they spend too much
money on one game, and not enough on another one? Were they
moochers who expected the gaming media to spend all of our time
and money on them? Did they never advertise with gaming media
outlets that made them millions of dollars? Were they
ungrateful, selfish, and self absorbed? Were their games subpar?
It would be nice to have a conversation in the gaming industry
on why certain companies went under. It can only happen if these
companies start to become open and transparent. What do you
think? Would you like to know more about why these companies
vanish?
Paul Bury
Family Friendly Gaming
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