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| Type | Subsidiary |
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| Industry | Video games |
| Founded | May 12, 2005 in South Jordan, Utah, US |
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| Headquarters | , US |
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| Parent | Epic Games (2008–present) |
Chair Entertainment Group, LLC (stylized as ChAIR) is an American video game developer based in Salt Lake City. The company was acquired by Epic Games in 2008.
Chair Entertainment was formed in 2005 by Donald Mustard and Geremy Mustard, CEO Ryan Holmes, and other key Advent Rising [1] core design team members Bert Lewis, Orlando Barrowes, Nathan Trewartha, Cameron Dayton and Jared Trulock. Soon after, Chair licensed the literary rights to its Empire property to best-selling author Orson Scott Card. [2] The novel Empire was published by Tor Books and debuted as a New York Times Best-Seller in November 2006. Card has since released the literary sequel Hidden Empire and committed to writing additional novels for the series. Chair also secured an option with Joel Silver and Warner Bros. for the Empire movie, which is currently in development. [3] Additionally, Chair has retained the rights to produce future video games and comic books based on its Empire property. [4]
Chair began production on its first Xbox Live Arcade game, Undertow , in the fall of 2006. Released on November 21, 2007, Undertow is a fast-paced, action-shooter that takes place entirely underwater. Upon release, Undertow won numerous E3 and Editor's Choice awards and was named Xbox Live Arcade Game of the Year by Official Xbox Magazine. [5]
On January 29, 2008, Chair announced it had acquired the interactive rights to Orson Scott Card's novel Ender's Game with plans to adapt the best-selling novel as a digitally distributed video game for all viable downloadable platforms. [6] [7] [8] In May 2008, Chair Entertainment was acquired by Epic Games. [9] On August 19, 2009, Chair released its second game, Shadow Complex , exclusively for Xbox Live Arcade. The game was published by Microsoft Game Studios and won more than 45 Game of the Year and 35 E3 and Editors Choice Awards.[ citation needed ] The game was released to positive reviews, with a score of 88 out of 100 on Metacritic.com as of July 10, 2010. [10] Shadow Complex featured a story written by famed comic book author Peter David and was set in Chair's Empire universe.
On September 1, 2010, Chair's next title, code-named "Project Sword", was announced at the Apple Fall Event 2010. [11] The game, Infinity Blade , a sword fighting title playable on iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad, was released December 2010, and is the first game on Apple mobile devices powered by Unreal Engine 3. It utilizes Apple's new GameCenter online gaming service. A tech demo for UE3, entitled Epic Citadel was released on iTunes the same day as a free download (though it was created by Epic Games, not Chair).
In October 2010, Chair relocated from Provo, Utah to Salt Lake City, Utah. Chair relocated to its current studio in South Jordan, Utah in 2013.
On December 14, 2010, Chair Entertainment confirmed in an interview that it had ceased development on the video game version of Ender's Game in favor of a continued focus on developing its own original intellectual properties. [12]
On October 3, 2011, Chair released the book, Infinity Blade: Awakening , written by Brandon Sanderson. [13]
During the Apple Fall Event 2011, Infinity Blade II was announced, with new features and visuals which took advantage of the next generation of iOS hardware (the iPad 2 and iPhone 4S). The game was released on December 1, 2011.
On January 5, 2012, Epic Games announced that the Infinity Blade franchise had generated over $23 million in revenue. [14]
In August 2013, Chair released the literary sequel, Infinity Blade: Redemption , also written by Brandon Sanderson.
At the Apple iPhone 5S conference on September 11, 2013, Infinity Blade III , allegedly the final Infinity Blade game in the series, was announced by Donald Mustard and Geremy Mustard, who took the stage to provide a live demo. Infinity Blade III debuted at #1 on the App Store on September 18, 2013. The game featured the exclusive debut of the original, Infinity Blade-inspired song "Monster" from award-winning alternative rock band Imagine Dragons.
In late 2015 Chair released a remastered version of Shadow Complex for Windows PC with a PlayStation 4 and Xbox One release announced for early 2016. [15]
On November 11, 2015 Donald Mustard and director J. J. Abrams released a video announcing a collaboration between ChAIR and Bad Robot to develop a new video game property code-named Spyjinx. [16]
In early 2016, Donald Mustard assumed the role of Worldwide Creative Director for Epic Games, overseeing design and creative development for Epic's full portfolio of video games. [17]
BioWare is a Canadian video game developer based in Edmonton, Alberta. It was founded in 1995 by newly graduated medical doctors Ray Muzyka, Greg Zeschuk and Augustine Yip, alongside Trent Oster, Brent Oster, and Marcel Zeschuk. Since 2007, the company has been owned by American publisher Electronic Arts.
Unreal Engine (UE) is a series of 3D computer graphics game engines developed by Epic Games, first showcased in the 1998 first-person shooter video game Unreal. Initially developed for PC first-person shooters, it has since been used in a variety of genres of games and has seen adoption by other industries, most notably the film and television industry. Unreal Engine is written in C++ and features a high degree of portability, supporting a wide range of desktop, mobile, console, and virtual reality platforms.
The Ender's Game series is a series of science fiction books written by American author Orson Scott Card. The series started with the novelette Ender's Game, which was later expanded into the novel of the same title. It currently consists of sixteen novels, thirteen short stories, 47 comic issues, an audioplay, and a film. The first two novels in the series, Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead, each won both the Hugo and Nebula Awards.
Epic Games, Inc. is an American video game and software developer and publisher based in Cary, North Carolina. The company was founded by Tim Sweeney as Potomac Computer Systems in 1991, originally located in his parents' house in Potomac, Maryland. Following its first commercial video game release, ZZT (1991), the company became Epic MegaGames, Inc. in early 1992 and brought on Mark Rein, who has been its vice president since. After moving the headquarters to Cary in 1999, the studio changed its name to Epic Games.
Over one hundred video games based on the Star Wars franchise have been released, dating back to some of the earliest home consoles. Some are based directly on films while others rely heavily on the Star Wars Expanded Universe.
Advent Rising is an action-adventure third-person shooter video game developed by GlyphX Games and published by Majesco Entertainment. The game was released on May 31, 2005, for Xbox and on August 9, 2005, for Microsoft Windows. Its story was created by Donald and Geremy Mustard and featured a script written by science fiction writers Orson Scott Card and Cameron Dayton; the full orchestral soundtrack was done by Tommy Tallarico and Emmanuel Fratianni. As of September 14, 2006, Steam began offering Advent Rising for download.
Xbox Live Arcade (XBLA) is a video game digital distribution service available through the Xbox Games Store, Microsoft's digital sales platform for the Xbox 360. It focused on smaller downloadable games from both major publishers and independent game developers. Titles ranged from classic console and arcade video games, to new games designed from the ground up for the service. Games available through the XBLA service ranged from $5–20 in price, and as of October 2016, there have been 719 Xbox Live Arcade titles released for the Xbox 360. Prior to the Xbox 360, "Xbox Live Arcade" was the name for an online distribution network on the original Xbox, which was replaced by the Xbox Live Marketplace.
Empire is a 2006 dystopian novel by American writer Orson Scott Card. It tells the story of a possible Second American Civil War, this time between the Right wing and Left wing in the near future. It is the first of the two books in the Empire duet, followed by Hidden Empire with the video game Shadow Complex bridging the two.
Michael V. Capps or Mike Capps is an American video game designer who was the president of Epic Games, based in Cary, North Carolina from 2002 to 2012. In 2018, he co-founded a new artificial intelligence company called Howso. He has been described as "a legendary figure in the video game industry."
Undertow is a video game developed by Chair Entertainment for the Xbox 360's Xbox Live Arcade service.
Shadow Complex is a platform-adventure Metroidvania video game developed by Chair Entertainment in association with Epic Games and published by Microsoft Game Studios for the Xbox 360 in 2009.
Respawn Entertainment, LLC is an American video game development studio founded in 2010 by Jason West and Vince Zampella and owned by Electronic Arts since 2017. West and Zampella previously co-founded Infinity Ward and created the Call of Duty franchise, where they were responsible for its development until 2010.
Infinity Blade was an action role-playing game developed by Chair Entertainment and Epic Games and released through the Apple App Store on December 9, 2010. It was the first iOS video game to run on the Unreal Engine. In the game, the unnamed player character fights a series of one-on-one battles in a derelict castle to face the immortal God King. When in battle, players swipe the screen to attack and parry, and tap the screen to dodge and block enemy attacks. Upon defeat, the player restarts the game as the character's descendant with the same items and experience level.
Infinity Blade: Awakening is a novella by fantasy author Brandon Sanderson. It is based on the action role-playing iOS video game Infinity Blade developed by Chair Entertainment and Epic Games, and serves as a story bridge between the first and the second game. It was released as an e-book on October 3, 2011 which coincided with the release of the fourth update for Infinity Blade and the announcement of the sequel.
Infinity Blade II was an action role-playing video game for iOS developed by Chair Entertainment and Epic Games. The game was the sequel to Infinity Blade by the same developers.
Cloudgine Limited was a British video game developer based in Edinburgh. Founded in 2012 by Dave Jones, it focuses on cloud technologies for video games. It was acquired by Epic Games in 2018 and integrated.
Steven Polge is a game programmer, most noted for his work on Epic Games' Unreal series of games. Polge was hired by Epic in 1997 after creating the Reaper Bot, which is recognized by Guinness World Records as the first computer-controlled deathmatch opponent. In addition to programming on the franchise, he served as lead designer on Unreal Tournament 3, and has been credited on other Epic titles such as Gears of War, Shadow Complex and Fortnite.
Rod Fergusson is a Canadian video game producer, best known for overseeing the development of the Gears of War franchise, originally at Epic Games and then as head of The Coalition. More recently, Fergusson moved over to Blizzard Entertainment to oversee development on the Diablo series.
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