Creative Assembly | |
Company type | Subsidiary |
Industry | Video games |
Founded | 1987 |
Founder | Tim Ansell |
Headquarters | , England |
Key people | Gareth Edmondson (studio director) |
Products |
|
Number of employees | 882 [1] (2023) |
Parent | Sega (2005–present) |
Website | creative-assembly.com |
The Creative Assembly Limited (trade name: Creative Assembly) is a British video game developer based in Horsham, founded in 1987 by Tim Ansell. In its early years, the company worked on porting games to MS-DOS from Amiga and ZX Spectrum platforms, later working with Electronic Arts to produce a variety of games under the EA Sports brand. In 1999, the company had sufficient resources to attempt a new and original project, proceeding to develop the strategy computer game Shogun: Total War which was a critical and commercial hit, and is regarded as a benchmark strategy game. Subsequent titles in the Total War series was built following the success of Shogun: Total War, increasing the company's critical and commercial success.
In March 2005, Creative Assembly was acquired by Sega and became part of Sega Europe. [2] An Australian branch was operated from Fortitude Valley, Queensland as Sega Studios Australia. Under Sega, further Total War titles were developed, and Creative Assembly entered the console market with action-adventure games such as Spartan: Total Warrior , Viking: Battle for Asgard and Alien: Isolation .
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Creative Assembly was founded in 1987 by Tim Ansell. [3] [a] Ansell had begun professional computer programming in 1985, working on video games for the Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64, and Atari 8-bit computers. Initially, Ansell kept the company small so he could personally work on computer programming. The company's early work, often produced personally by Ansell, involved porting games from the Amiga to MS-DOS, such as the 1989 titles Geoff Crammond's Stunt Car Racer and Shadow of the Beast by Psygnosis. Creative Assembly began work with Electronic Arts in 1993, producing titles under the EA Sports label, starting with the DOS version of the early FIFA games. With EA Sports, Creative Assembly was able to produce low development risk products bearing official league endorsements. The company's products included Rugby World Cup titles for 1995 and 2001, the game for the 1999 Cricket World Cup and the Australian Football League games for 1998 and 1999, of which the AFL 98 title was particularly successful in the Australian market. When it became clear that the company needed to expand further, Ansell employed Michael Simpson in 1996 as the creative director. Simpson, a microchip designer turned video game designer, later became the driving force for the creative design of the Total War series. Ansell left Creative Assembly after Sega acquired the developer in 2005. Later, Tim Heaton took over as the company’s studio director.
As a result of their success in sports titles, by 1999 Creative Assembly had sufficient resources and backing from Electronic Arts to develop more high risk titles in other genres. The result was Shogun: Total War , the company's breakthrough title. A blend of real-time tactics and turn-based gameplay, Shogun: Total War was announced in early 1999. The game focused the Sengoku period of Japanese feudal history, and upon its release in June 2000 it was met with critical acclaim. The game won multiple industry awards and became regarded as one of the benchmark strategy video games. [6] [7] Inhouse composer Jeff van Dyck won both a BAFTA and an EMMA award for his work on the game's soundtrack. [6] In May 2001, Creative Assembly announced The Mongol Invasion , an expansion pack focusing on the earlier Mongol invasions of Japan. Released in August 2001, the expansion pack also received a positive response.
Soon after, Creative Assembly broke away from Electronic Arts, instead using Activision as a publisher and distributor. In August 2001, Creative Assembly announced a second Total War, set in the Middle Ages. Medieval: Total War was of a larger scope than Shogun: Total War, spanning a larger time period and the entirety of Medieval Europe. Released in August 2002, the game was a greater success than Shogun: Total War, becoming the best-selling video game in the UK for the first two weeks, and the fourth best-selling game in the US market in its first week. As with Shogun: Total War, Medieval: Total War won multiple industry awards, and was named the top game of 2002 by PC Gamer . [8] Creative Assembly was awarded the "PC Game Developer of the Year" award at the 2003 European Computer Trade Show. [9] Viking Invasion , an expansion pack focusing on the Viking invasion of Britain in the Dark Ages, was released in May 2003.
A third Total War title was announced in January 2003. Entitled Rome: Total War , the game featured a new game engine to Shogun: Total War and Medieval: Total War, and redesigned the approach to the series. Set during the late Roman Republic and preliminary decades of the Roman Empire, the game's code was used for two television shows: the BBC's Time Commanders [10] and the History Channel's Decisive Battles . [11] Upon release in September 2004, the game was given praise, becoming one of the year's top ten best-selling titles. [12]
Despite speculation that Activision might buy Creative Assembly, as the publisher had done with previous successful developers under its wing, [13] the Japanese company Sega announced on 9 March 2005 that they had sealed an acquisition deal with Creative Assembly, [13] purchasing all issued shares in the company. [14] Sega explained that the acquisition was to strengthen Sega Europe's presence in the European and North American video game markets. [15] All preceding titles in the Total War series had been exclusively computer games. By July 2005, Sega had acquired the publishing rights to Rome: Total War from Activision, [16] and built on the brand strategy by releasing two expansion packs: Barbarian Invasion in September 2005 and Alexander in September 2006. Spartan: Total Warrior was released in October 2005 on Xbox, PlayStation 2 and GameCube, receiving a mixed reception from critics. [17] [18] [19]
Medieval II: Total War , the fourth title in the franchise, was announced in January 2006 and developed by the Australian branch of Creative Assembly. [20] [21] It was a remake of the earlier Medieval: Total War using the new assets and technology behind Rome: Total War. The game was released in November 2006, and although not as successful as Rome: Total War, [22] Medieval II: Total War was still a critical and commercial hit, holding a place in the UK games charts in November 2006, [23] and in the US charts until the end of January 2007. [24] An expansion pack, Kingdoms , was announced in March 2007. The expansion received a positive reception from critics upon release in August 2007. [25]
At the Games Convention in August 2007, Creative Assembly announced new titles. The first, Viking: Battle for Asgard , was a console-exclusive title, similar in style to Spartan: Total Warrior, but focusing on Norse mythology. [26] The game was released in March 2008. It received an average reception from critics in the industry. [27] [28] The second title was a fifth Total War instalment, Empire: Total War , set in the early modern period of the 18th century and early 19th century. [29] As was the case with Rome: Total War, Empire: Total War features a redesigned approach to the series and a new game engine. It was released in March 2009, receiving high praise, [30] selling double the number of units sold of Medieval II: Total War and Rome: Total War. However, numerous significant issues were pointed out by critics after the release. Though there were numerous patches, not all of these were addressed by the abandonment of support for the game, which caused many to question Sega's influence on Creative Assembly. [31] In July 2008, Creative Assembly announced Stormrise . Unlike previous historically-based games, Stormrise is a science fiction real-time strategy game developed for both consoles and PC, released in 2009. [32] Stormrise received negative and mediocre responses, with criticisms focusing on broken pathfinding and the game's flawed control scheme (designed with the intent to create an easy interface for consoles). [33] [34] In January 2009, Creative Assembly was joined by Tim Heaton, who serves as the company's studio director. [2]
The Australian branch of the Creative Assembly ported the first three Sonic the Hedgehog games and the Sonic & Knuckles lock-on games to Sonic Classic Collection . This compilation received overall positive reviews from Aussie-Nintendo and Official Nintendo Magazine , but criticised some speed issues when playing, rarely speeding up or slowing down and some graphical and sound glitches. Reviewers also criticised the removal of multiplayer in the games, previously available in earlier versions of the games. In 2010, the company released Napoleon: Total War , based on the exploits of Napoleon Bonaparte to generally favourable reviews that praised the tightly scripted elements of a smaller, more focussed campaign than its globe-spanning predecessor, Empire Total War. [35] The company released Total War: Shogun 2 in 2011, to universal acclaim. [36] The title is the first to make the brand Total War the main title, in an effort to increase brand awareness. [37]
On 6 December 2012, a partnership between Games Workshop and Creative Assembly was announced. Also announced was the creation of a new Warhammer Fantasy Battle game. On 5 April 2013, it was announced that Sega Studios Australia (formerly known as The Creative Assembly Australia) will be shut down later in the year. [38] On 3 September 2013, Creative Assembly released Total War: Rome II . The game uses an updated Warscape engine and suffered from technical issues shortly after release which eventually led to Creative Assembly's creative director, Mike Simpson, apologising publicly for the widespread technical issues. [39] In the ten months following release, Creative Assembly released fourteen patches for the game, solving most technical issues and balancing gameplay. As of July 2014, the game currently stands at a rating of 76/100 on Metacritic by critics. [40]
Alien: Isolation is a first person stealth horror game based on the film Alien . [41] The game was released on 7 October 2014 for PC, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One. [42] In 2016, the company released the game Total War: Warhammer , which was the first game in a trilogy. [43]
In February 2017, the studio released Halo Wars 2 , which received positive reviews. [44] In March 2017 Creative Assembly announced the acquisition of Crytek Black Sea, which was shut down in December 2016. [45] This was the first studio opened by Creative Assembly abroad. The studio has been renamed to Creative Assembly Sofia. [46]
In September 2017, the studio released the second game in the Warhammer Fantasy series, Total War: Warhammer II . In May 2018, Creative Assembly then went on to release the Thrones of Britannia , the first in its Saga Series. In February 2019, Creative Assembly announced the cancellation of Total War: Arena .
Total War: Three Kingdoms has been released as of 23 May 2019, and received positive reviews. Total War: Warhammer III was released on 17 February 2022.
On 28 September 2023, Sega announced it was cancelling Hyenas . [47] [48] As a result of the cancellation, an unknown number of employees were laid off from Creative Assembly. [49] In March 2024, Sega announced it would cut 240 roles across Sega Europe, Creative Assembly and Sega HARDlight. [50]
Total War is a series of strategy games developed by British developer Creative Assembly for personal computers. They combine turn-based strategy and resource management with real-time tactical control of battles. Rather uniquely for real-time strategy games, flanking manoeuvers and formations factor heavily into gameplay. The first of the series, Shogun: Total War, was released in June 2000. The most recent major game released was Total War: Pharaoh on 11 October 2023. As of April 2021, the series had sold over 36 million copies.
Relic Entertainment Inc. is a Canadian video game developer based in Vancouver, founded in 1997. The studio specializes in real-time strategy games and is known for series such as Homeworld, Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War and Company of Heroes. Acquired by THQ in 2004, the company was sold to Sega on January 22, 2013, as part of THQ's bankruptcy and operated under its European division. By May 2024, Relic had secured a partnership with an external investment group, allowing it to split from Sega and operate independently.
Shogun: Total War is a turn-based strategy and real-time tactics video game developed by The Creative Assembly and published by Electronic Arts for Microsoft Windows personal computers. Released in June 2000, the game became the debut title in The Creative Assembly's Total War series. Set in Japan during Sengoku jidai—the "Warring States" period from the 15th to the beginning of the 17th century—the game has players adopt the leader of a contemporary Japanese clan, attempt to conquer the nation and claim the position of shōgun. The turn-based aspect of the game focuses on a map of Japan where military force, religion, diplomacy, espionage and economics all influence the player's actions, whilst battles are fought in a 3D real-time mode.
Medieval: Total War is a turn-based strategy and real-time tactics computer game developed by Creative Assembly and published by Activision. Set in the Middle Ages, it is the second game in the Total War series, following on from the 2000 title Shogun: Total War. Originally announced in August 2001, the game was released in North America on 20 August 2002 and in Europe on 30 August for Microsoft Windows.
Rome: Total War is a strategy video game developed by The Creative Assembly and originally published by Activision; its publishing rights have since passed to Sega. The game was released for Microsoft Windows in 2004. The Mac OS X version was released on February 5, 2010, by Feral Interactive, who also released the iPad version on November 10, 2016, the iPhone version on August 23, 2018, and the Android version on December 19, 2018. The game is the third title in The Creative Assembly's Total War series, following Shogun: Total War, and Medieval: Total War.
Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning was a massively multiplayer online role-playing game based on Games Workshop's Warhammer Fantasy setting, developed by Mythic Entertainment and published by Electronic Arts in 2008. The game revolved around the continual worldwide conflict that the Warhammer Fantasy setting is known for, and the game is geared toward ongoing, constant war laced with dark humour. Age of Reckoning ended up selling over a million copies and peaking at 800,000 subscribers, but dropped to 300,000 subscribers several months later. The game received generally positive reviews from critics but shut down in 2013. Since at least 2014, an active private server called Return of Reckoning has been run by fans, and it remains active as of January 2025.
Sega Black Sea EOOD, officially doing business as Creative Assembly Sofia is a Bulgarian video game developer based in Sofia. It was founded in May 2001 by Vesselin Handjiev. In July 2008, the company was acquired by Crytek, which then sold it to Creative Assembly in March 2017.
Medieval II: Total War is a strategy video game developed by the since-disbanded Australian branch of The Creative Assembly and published by Sega. It was released for Microsoft Windows on 10 November 2006. Feral Interactive published versions of the game for macOS and Linux on 14 January 2016. It is the sequel to 2002's Medieval: Total War and the fourth title in the Total War series.
Empire: Total War is a turn-based strategy and real-time tactics video game developed by Creative Assembly and published by Sega. The fifth installment in the Total War series, the game was released in 2009. The game, which focuses on the early modern period of the 18th century, was announced at the Leipzig Games Convention in August 2007. The macOS version of the game was released by Feral Interactive on 10 June 2014. The Linux version was released, also by Feral Interactive, on 8 December 2014.
Stormrise is a real-time tactics video game developed by Creative Assembly's Australian studio and published by Sega for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360. It is set in a post-apocalyptic world.
Napoleon: Total War is a turn-based strategy and real-time tactics video game developed by Creative Assembly and published by Sega for the Microsoft Windows and macOS. Napoleon was released in North America on 23 February 2010, and in Europe on 26 February. The game is the sixth stand-alone installment in the Total War series. The game is set in Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East during the French Revolutionary Wars and Napoleonic Wars. Players assume the role of Napoleon Bonaparte, or one of his major rivals, on a turn-based campaign map and engage in the subsequent battles in real-time. As with its predecessor, Empire: Total War, which included a special United States storyline, Napoleon features three special campaigns that follow the general's career.
Total War: Rome II is a strategy video game developed by Creative Assembly and published by Sega. It was released on 3 September 2013, for Microsoft Windows as the eighth standalone game in the Total War series of video games and the successor to the 2004 game Rome: Total War.
Total War: Warhammer is a 2016 turn-based strategy and real-time tactics video game developed by Creative Assembly and published by Sega for Windows via the Steam gaming platform. The game was brought to macOS and Linux by Feral Interactive. The game features the gameplay of the Total War series with factions of Games Workshop's Warhammer Fantasy series; it is the first Total War game not to portray a historical setting. It is the tenth title in the Total War series and the first title to be released in the Total War: Warhammer trilogy.
Total War: Warhammer II is a turn-based strategy and real-time tactics video game developed by Creative Assembly and published by Sega. It is part of the Total War series and the sequel to 2016's Total War: Warhammer. The game is set in Games Workshop's Warhammer Fantasy fictional universe. The game was released for Windows-based PCs on 28 September 2017. Feral Interactive released the game on macOS and Linux on 20 November 2018. Total War: Warhammer II was succeeded by Total War: Warhammer III, which was released in February 2022. The game requires a Steam account to play.
Total War Battles: Shogun is a real-time strategy video game spinoff of the Total War series developed by Creative Assembly and published by Sega. It was released on April 19, 2012 for iOS and on August 29, 2012 for Windows. It is not to be confused with the strategy game Shogun: Total War, released by the same publisher.
Total War: Three Kingdoms is a turn-based strategy real-time tactics video game developed by Creative Assembly and published by Sega. As the 12th mainline entry in the Total War series, the game was released for Windows on May 23, 2019. Feral Interactive released a Linux and macOS version of the game on the same day.
Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia is a turn-based strategy and real-time tactics video game developed by Creative Assembly and published by Sega, released on 3 May 2018 for Windows. The game was brought to macOS and Linux by Feral Interactive on 24 May 2018 and 7 June 2018 respectively. It is the twelfth game in the Total War series of video games.
Total War Saga: Troy is a 2020 turn-based strategy video game developed by Creative Assembly Sofia and published by Sega. The game was released for Windows and MacOS on 13 August 2020 as the second installment in the Total War Saga subseries, succeeding Thrones of Britannia (2018). The game received generally positive reviews upon release.
Total War: Warhammer III is a turn-based strategy and real-time tactics video game developed by Creative Assembly and published by Sega. It is part of the Total War series, and the third to be set in Games Workshop's Warhammer Fantasy fictional universe. The game was announced on 3 February 2021 and was released on 17 February 2022. It received positive reviews from critics and was nominated for the British Academy Games Award for British Game at the 19th British Academy Games Awards.