Meteor Games
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| Private | |
| Industry | Computer and video game industry |
| Fate | bankrupted |
| Founded | California, United States (2007) |
| Founders |
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| Defunct | January 27, 2012 |
| Headquarters | West Hollywood, California, United States |
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Key people
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| Products |
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Number of employees
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100 |
| Website | meteorgames |
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Footnotes / references |
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Meteor Games was an independent online gaming studio formed in 2007 by Neopets founders Adam Powell and Donna Powell.
According to a statement released by the company, its games will "cross the appeal of social networks, web-based casual games and traditional massively multiplayer online games."
Meteor Games was an independent online gaming studio committed to developing "fun, immersive, and innovative games spanning the web, social networks, and mobile devices". The company was founded in 2007 by the creators of the Internet phenomenon Neopets and were headquartered in Beverly Hills, CA.
The headquarters was located in Los Angeles and had at its peak 100 employees.
Meteor Games' first project was the MMO Twin Skies, with the first public demo of the game being shown at the Penny Arcade Expo (PAX) in Seattle. The game was originally planned to be in 3D, but was later changed to become a 2D Flash game.
In the company's shift to the rapidly growing social gaming market it released several games based on internal intellectual property including: Island Paradise which became a large commercial success, Serf Wars, and Ranch Town.
In October 2011 26 workers were laid off and at the end of November 2011 it was acknowledged that all but those related to maintenance of the remaining games run by Meteor Games on Facebook were being let go. Then somewhere around March or April 2012, the remainder of the Meteor Games staff were let go after Island Paradise was shut down around April. At the same time it was confirmed that then CEO Zac Brandenberg, who joined the company in 2010, had left in November, leaving Adam and Donna Powell to oversee the site. Sometime in either 2010 (around when Zac Brandenberg left) or early 2011, Adam also exited Meteor Games, which left Donna as sole COO and CEO of the company.
Twin Skies was a planned flash game to be created through Meteor Games as their first gaming project. Initial response to the game's announcement at the 2008 Penny Arcade Expo was positive. Later reports stated that Meteor Games had scrapped plans to release the game as a MMOG, but moved to produce the game via flash due to economic issues. The move was met with disappointment by gaming websites such as Kotaku, who commented that it was "a pity" as the "original concept was extremely intriguing." Gameplay was initially planned to include several elements such as social interaction and mini-flash games that would have directly influenced the world in the Twin Skies MMO.Twin Skies was originally planned to enter beta testing in late 2008, with a projected full launch in 2009, but was later cancelled due to massive layoffs at Meteor Games.
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Wikipedia