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Westwood Studios was an American developer of computer and video games.
Based in Las Vegas, the company was founded as Westwood Associates by Brett Sperry and Louis Castle in 1985.
Their first projects were contract work for companies like Epyx and SSI, porting 8-bit titles to 16-bit systems like Commodore Amiga and Atari ST. Their first original title was Mars Saga, developed for Electronic Arts in 1988. Other publishers that published Westwood games were Infocom and Disney. One of Westwood's first hits was Eye of the Beholder, a real-time computer role-playing game based on the Dungeons & Dragons license, developed for SSI. Proceeds from contract work allowed the company to expand into designing its own games in-house.
In 1992, the company was renamed Westwood Studios and sold to Virgin Interactive. Some of the famous games from this period include Dune II, the adventure game The Legend of Kyrandia and the RPG Lands of Lore.
Westwood's biggest hit was the real-time strategy game Command & Conquer released in 1995. Building on the gameplay and interface ideas of Dune II, it added pre-rendered 3D graphics for gameplay sprites and video cinematics, a techno soundtrack streamed from disk, and modem play.
Command & Conquer, Kyrandia, and Lands of Lore all spawned multiple sequels.
In 1998, Westwood was acquired by Electronic Arts. Like many companies before it, Westwood thought EA would maintain its brand and its independence. Like many companies before it, Westwood discovered that EA was going to do exactly the opposite. Many of the people who had been with the company for a long time quit (several of them went on to found Petroglyph Games). One of their last games, "Command & Conquer: Renegade" (A FPS/RTS hybrid) failed to meet expectations, and was not the great sucess Westwood and EA hoped it would be. However, it is still a much loved game by many people, and kept alive solely by fans. EA's support is slim to nil.
In fact, a group of developers calling themselves Blackhand Studios offfered to take over support of the game from EA. EA's response wasn't positive. The developers went ahead without permission, aided by a former Westwood employee, and have created several custom additions for C&C Renegade in hopes of bringing it closer to what it could have been, even though their actions violate the game's End User Liscence Agreement. Many Command and Conquer fans would rather see BHS at the helm of Command and Conquer than EA. The comunity tends to see EA as somewhat of a demon, and no one disputes that EA's sole interest in the series is its profitability.
In March of 2003, Westwood Studios was closed by EA and all willing staff were absorbed into EA Los Angeles. At the time of its closure, Westwood employed more than 100 people in the Las Vegas area and was one of the few big computer businesses there.
Many fans of the Command and Conquer series have much dislike for the way Westwood was handled by EA.
Their last game was the MMORPG Earth & Beyond.
Louis Castle, one of the founders of Westwood Studios, became an executive at EA.
Selected games developed by Westwood
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