Black Ops Entertainment

Last updated

Black Ops Entertainment
Industry Video games
Founded1994
Defunct2019
FateGame studio shut down in 2006; continued as app developer until 2019.
Headquarters
Santa Monica, California
,
United States
Key people
John Botti
ProductsVideo games
Mobile apps
Number of employees
30 (2002)
Website blackops.com

Black Ops Entertainment was an American mobile app developer and former video game developer located in Santa Monica, California. [1] From 1994 it developed sixteen games for several platforms, including the PlayStation, Nintendo 64, PlayStation 2, GameCube, and Xbox. After the games team was shut down in 2006, founder John Botti continued to use the name while developing stock trading apps for iOS and Android. The last of these was aiTrader in 2019. [1] [2]

Contents

History

The company was founded by four MIT graduates in 1994, who developed a SNES Volleyball prototype. Virgin Games contracted them to produce Agile Warrior , which necessitated recruiting a larger team. Initially developing out of their homes, the studio later established their Santa Monica office. [3] [1]

Black Ops became known for their line of sports titles, including their contributions to the NCAA Basketball series. [4] The developer received an AIAS award in 2000, with Knockout Kings 2000 winning console sports game of the year. [5] In the early 2000s, Black Ops released two street basketball titles; Street Hoops and AND 1 Streetball . The decision to move to street basketball as opposed to continuing with NCAA came from a desire to be able to develop "unique play styles with no rules", and avoid the need for permission from the NCAA. The team size peaked at 30 developers during the development of Street Hoops in 2002. [6]

The video game studio shut down in 2006, though John Botti continued producing iOS and Android apps under the moniker such as iTraderPro (2011) and aiTrader (2019). [2] [7] [8]

Titles

Games

YearTitlePlatform(s)Publisher
1995 Agile Warrior F-111X PC, PS1 Virgin Interactive
1996 Black Dawn PS1, Saturn
1997 Treasures of the Deep PS1 Namco/Sony Computer Entertainment
1999 Knockout Kings PS1, N64 EA Sports
1999 Warpath: Jurassic Park PS1 EA Games/DreamWorks Interactive
007: Tomorrow Never Dies EA Games/MGM Interactive
NCAA March Madness 2000 EA Sports
2000 007: The World Is Not Enough EA Games
Knockout Kings 2001 PS1, PS2 EA Sports
NCAA March Madness 2001 PS1
2002 Knockout Kings 2002 PS2, Xbox
Street Hoops PS2, Xbox, GameCube Activision
2003 Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines PS2, Xbox Atari
America's 10 Most Wanted PC, PS2 Encore Software/Play-It
2004 The X-Files: Resist or Serve PS2 Vivendi Universal Games
2006 AND 1 Streetball [1] PS2, Xbox Ubisoft

Apps

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References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "Black Ops Entertainment". www.blackops.com.
  2. 1 2 "Black Ops Entertainment". www.blackops.com.
  3. ↑ "Disney Interactive's José Villeta Shares Career Path & Talks Disney Infinity 3.0". Latin Post - Latin news, immigration, politics, culture. December 9, 2015.
  4. ↑ "The Street Hoops Interview - IGN". May 30, 2002 – via www.ign.com.
  5. ↑ "Game Developer Details". www.interactive.org.
  6. ↑ "Street Hoops Q&A".
  7. ↑ "Black Ops Entertainment". www.blackops.com.
  8. ↑ Jack Dorsey (May 16, 2019). "What happened to Black ops?". Retro Gamer. Retrieved October 12, 2023– via Press Reader.
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