Obsidian Entertainment
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| Obsidian Entertainment | |
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| Type | Private |
| Founded | Santa Ana, California (2003) |
| Headquarters | Santa Ana, California |
| Key people | Feargus Urquhart, CEO Chris Parker, CDO & Executive Producer Darren Monahan, CIO & Executive Producer Chris Avellone, Creative Director Chris Jones, Technical Director |
| Products | Star Wars: KotOR II Neverwinter Nights 2 (See complete products listing.) |
| Employees | 110 (2006) |
| Website | www.obsidianent.com |
Obsidian Entertainment, founded and located in Santa Ana, California since 2003 after the disestablishment of Interplay Productions' Black Isle Studios, is a video game developer for PC and console systems. Obsidian continues to operate under management by its founding officers: Feargus Urquhart, Chris Parker, Darren Monahan, Chris Avellone and Chris Jones. In July 2005 they hired Josh Sawyer of Icewind Dale fame. In May 2007 composer Alexander Brandon was hired to head the Audio Department.
[edit] Games
Obsidian Entertainment code-names its projects after a name of a U.S. state.
- Project Delaware — Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, released in 2004 for Xbox and in 2005 for PC
- Project Pennsylvania — Neverwinter Nights 2, released for PC in 2006
- Project New Jersey — cancelled[citation needed]
- Project ? — Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer, released for PC in 2007
- Project Georgia — Alpha Protocol (in development)
- Project Connecticut — Aliens RPG using Obsidian's proprietary Onyx engine (in development)
- Project ? — Neverwinter Nights 2: Storm of Zehir (in development)
The first two games are sequels to products originally engineered by BioWare. There is also a game to be announced, codenamed "Project New Jersey", confirmed by former Obsidian employee John Morgan not to be a sequel. Also by words of Urquhart, the company hopes to be around 115 employees by the end of 2006, forming in 2 and a half teams, who will be working on three projects simultaneously. Knights of the Old Republic III is also in the plans of the company, should LucasArts desire it in the future.
On March 23, 2006, Obsidian and Sega announced that they will co-develop a role-playing game (codename: Project Georgia) based on a new franchise. It is currently slated for release on the PC, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360. The April 2008 issue of "Game Informer" revealed this project to be "Alpha Protocol," an RPG set in a modern-day spy adventure setting.
On December 13, 2006, Sega officially announced on their Aliens teaser page that Obsidian Entertainment has been signed to develop a role-playing game (codename: Project Connecticut) based on the Aliens film franchise.
