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RIP ‘Dead Space’ Dev Visceral Games
Sad news for those fans of Dead Space and Dante’s Inferno, as EA has decided to close down Visceral Games. The reasoning for the closure is due to the nature of Visceral’s current project, a single-player Star Wars game, and the view based on “fundamental shifts in the marketplace” that require EA to “pivot the design”. That game will now be headed up by EA Vancouver.
Visceral Games started out as EA’s Redwood Shores studio. The studio changed its name to Visceral Games in 2009 following the release of Dead Space in 2008. Their catalog of games ranges from the previously mentioned Dead Space series and Dante’s Inferno, to licensed games based on films like The Godfather and Lord Of The Rings. Recently, the company spent time working on DLC for Battlefield and the spin-off Battlefield Hardline.
Obviously, anyone who’s been around the industry knows that this happens on occasion, and EA is no stranger to situations like these. Studios like Maxis, Bullfrog, Pandemic, Origin and Westwood have all been laid to rest under EA’s watch, mostly due to poor performance of those studios’ games. And after the lukewarm reception to Dead Space 3, and the franchise’s subsequent hibernation, it seemed like it was only a matter of time.
— Visceral Games (@VisceralGames) October 17, 2017
This story was originally posted on Plenty Dreadful. Head there for more horror video game goodness!
The best part about engaging with collaborative genre fiction on the internet is that anyone can get in on the action, with worldwide accessibility often resulting in absurd story beats that wouldn’t be possible if any single person was responsible for the entire narrative. And while Kane Parsons’ Backrooms film is definitely the young filmmaker’s own unique take on the infamous creepypasta, it’s fun to see other creators join the Backrooms sandbox now that the big screen adaptation is getting ready for a record-shattering opening weekend.
As if cleverly timed releases like Puppet Combo’s The Backrooms game weren’t enough (not to mention that Scary Movie poster poking fun at Parsons’ flick), McDonald’s official social media accounts have now released an analog horror video of their own celebrating the liminal terrors of the McRooms – complete with a familiar purple surprise at the end of the footage.
While it’s funny enough to see the world’s most recognizable Fast Food giant engage with internet-borne Found Footage thrills seemingly out of the blue, the video is actually referencing a long-running gag among the Backrooms fandom where creators jokingly talk about there being a fully functional McDonald’s restaurant hidden somewhere in level 0 of the infamous liminal labyrinth.
Now, would it be too much to hope for a moist-carpet-flavored McShake to tie in with the film?
Backrooms is now playing only in theaters from A24.
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