Disney Shuts Down LucasArts Studio
Disney purchased the Lucasfilm from owner George Lucas in October of 2012 and have started changed the company little by little to streamline business. The first major casualty is LucasArts which is the video game division of Lucasfilm with 150 people laid off. Disney is still going to use the name LucasArts to license games but the studio is no more.
The LucasArts brand began in 1982 and developed in the beginning the video game world of the Star Wars universe as well as many other popular titles such as Monkey Island and Maniac Mansion. The popularity came with the PC game hits of the 90’s such X-Wing vs Tie Fighter series and the doom style game Star Wars: Jedi Knight series.
In recent years the video game division has not released much in house instead of license the Star Wars brand to companies such as BioWare who developed the Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic and Star Wars The Old Republic games. The last game that was published by LucasArts was the Xbox Kinect title Kinect Star Wars in 2010 which was not excepted very highly because of the flaws in game play.
The studio was working on two new titles in the Star Wars Universe, Star Wars 1313 and Star Wars: First Assault which was announced at E3 last year and are now cancelled.
