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Deep Silver

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Deep Silver
Company typeDivision
IndustryVideo games
FoundedNovember 2002; 22 years ago (2002-11)
Headquarters
Höfen
,
Austria
Area served
Worldwide
ProductsSee List of Deep Silver games
ParentPlaion
Subsidiaries
Websitedeepsilver.com

Deep Silver is an Austrian video game publisher and a division of Plaion.[1]

History

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Deep Silver was announced in November 2002, with their first release to be Anarchy Online: The Notum Wars.[2] According to Craig McNichol, who ran Koch Media's England branch, the idea behind Deep Silver was to have a business segment that would develop games that would complement the games Koch Media was distributing on behalf of other publishers.[3] McNichol also stated that Deep Silver's name was subject to much internal discussion.[3] Koch Media invested €500,000 in Deep Silver in July 2003, and in November 2003, all of Koch Media's game publishing operations (excluding distribution) were reallocated to Deep Silver.[4][5] The division had been continuously active since, primarily in Europe.[1] In April 2008, Koch Media opened Deep Silver, Inc., a subsidiary branch based in Los Angeles, under Deep Silver's name.[6] In August 2007, Games That Matter, a studio founded by former Rockstar Vienna employees in 2006, was acquired by Koch Media and became part of Deep Silver under the name Deep Silver Vienna.[7] Co-founders Niki Laber and Hannes Seifert had left the studio by January 2010, at which point Deep Silver Vienna was shut down.[8][9] Deep Silver Vienna has only produced one game, Cursed Mountain, which was developed in association with Sproing Interactive and released in August 2009 for the Wii.[10]

Deep Silver first gained widespread attention with their release of Dead Island and their acquisition of Volition.[1] Dead Island had been their first release to reach the top spot on sales charts in September 2011,[11] and they acquired Volition in January 2013, alongside the rights to the Metro series, from the bankruptcy proceedings of THQ.[12] Deep Silver also acquired a minority interest in Berlin-based free-to-play game developer Infernum Productions in December 2012.[13] In February 2013, Deep Silver announced its intentions to expand into the mobile games market.[14]

In December 2013, Fishlabs, which had filed for self-administration the previous October, was acquired by Koch Media and became Deep Silver's dedicated mobile game studio.[15] As the agreement was an asset deal, the legal entity of the studio was dissolved and Fishlabs was reorganised as a division, officially known as Deep Silver Fishlabs.[15][16] In July 2014, Deep Silver acquired the rights to Homefront and its in-development sequel, Homefront: The Revolution, from German developer Crytek.[17] Dambuster Studios (officially, Deep Silver Dambuster Studios) was established to continue the development of The Revolution, succeeding Crytek UK.[17] Later on the same day, Crytek announced that Crytek UK would be closed, and all of its staff transferred to Dambuster Studios.[18] In August 2018, Koch Media acquired the rights to the TimeSplitters games, which would be overseen by Deep Silver.[19]

In May 2020, Koch Media and THQ Nordic, by this time both part of Embracer Group, exchanged several intellectual property rights: Deep Silver received Red Faction and Painkiller, while handing off Risen, Rush for Berlin, Sacred, Second Sight, and Singles: Flirt Up Your Life.[20]

In May 2021, Deep Silver and Koch Media, part of Embracer Group since 2018, announced that Free Radical Design had been re-founded. Work on a new part of the TimeSplitters series is to begin before the end of 2021.[21] In November 2022, Volition was transferred to Gearbox Entertainment, another company under Embracer Group. In December 2023, Free Radical Design was closed down amidst a widescale company restructuring from Embracer Group.[22]

Controversy

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In January 2013, Deep Silver announced a special edition of their then-upcoming game Dead Island: Riptide, titled Zombie Bait Edition, which would include a statuette of a mutilated female torso in Europe and Australia.[23] After strong criticism over the item, Deep Silver initially offered an apology, stating that they were "deeply sorry" and promising consumers that something like that would not happen again.[24] However, when the game was released in April that year, the bust was still included, generating further backlash.[24]

In January 2019, Deep Silver partnered with Epic Games on a one-year exclusivity deal for the PC version of their upcoming game Metro Exodus on Epic's digital distribution storefront, the Epic Games Store.[25] Through this deal, Metro Exodus was removed from Steam, another digital distribution storefront, where Deep Silver had been selling pre-orders for the game since August 2018.[26] Additionally, the deal was made and announced less than three weeks prior to game's release, causing criticism and confusion among critics and fans of the Metro franchise.[25] Valve, the company behind Steam, labelled the move as unfair to consumers, while fans review-bombed previous entries of the series on Steam.[26][27]

Games

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Main article: List of Deep Silver games

Franchises published by Deep Silver include Metro from 4A Games and Volition's Saints Row, both of which were acquired through THQ's bankruptcy auction in 2013, as well as Techland-created Dead Island. Other games include Homefront: The Revolution by Dambuster Studios, Shenmue III by Ys Net, and Payday 3 by Starbreeze Studios

References

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  1. ^ a b c Handrahan, Matthew (4 February 2013). "Koch Media: "We are not ambitious to be the next THQ"". GamesIndustry.biz. Archived from the original on 3 February 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  2. ^ Steininger, Stefan (12 November 2002). "Koch Media etabliert neues Label für Games". beta.gamesmarkt.de. Archived from the original on 16 May 2019. Retrieved 16 May 2019.
  3. ^ a b McNichol, Craig (5 August 2014). "Twenty years of Koch Media". MCV/Develop. Archived from the original on 9 February 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  4. ^ "Koch Media investiert 500.000 Euro in Deep Silver". beta.gamesmarkt.de. Archived from the original on 15 February 2019. Retrieved 14 February 2019.
  5. ^ "Koch Media konzentriert Spielepublishing auf Deep Silver". beta.gamesmarkt.de. Archived from the original on 15 February 2019. Retrieved 14 February 2019.
  6. ^ "Koch Media expands into US". MCV/Develop. 30 April 2008. Archived from the original on 9 February 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  7. ^ Martin, Matt (22 August 2007). "Koch acquires Games That Matter". GamesIndustry.biz. Archived from the original on 14 February 2019. Retrieved 13 February 2019.
  8. ^ Brice, Kath (1 February 2010). "Koch closes Deep Silver Vienna studio". GamesIndustry.biz. Archived from the original on 13 February 2019. Retrieved 13 February 2019.
  9. ^ "Koch Media schließt Deep Silver Vienna". beta.gamesmarkt.de. Archived from the original on 15 February 2019. Retrieved 14 February 2019.
  10. ^ Alexander, Leigh (1 February 2010). "Deep Silver Closes Vienna Studio". Gamasutra. Archived from the original on 10 December 2017. Retrieved 13 February 2019.
  11. ^ "Deep Silver Dead pleased with first No.1". MCV/Develop. 15 September 2011. Archived from the original on 9 February 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  12. ^ Goldfarb, Andrew (23 January 2013). "THQ Dissolved, Saints Row, Company of Heroes Devs Acquired". IGN. Archived from the original on 3 February 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  13. ^ Handrahan, Matthew (18 December 2012). "Koch Media invests in F2P dev Infernum Productions". GamesIndustry.biz. Archived from the original on 3 February 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  14. ^ Weber, Rachel (26 February 2013). "Deep Silver planning move into mobile". GamesIndustry.biz. Archived from the original on 2 February 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  15. ^ a b Corriea, Alexa Ray (2 December 2013). "Galaxy on Fire developer Fishlabs purchased by Koch Media". Polygon. Archived from the original on 3 February 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  16. ^ Chapple, Craig (14 May 2014). "'It was the hardest time we've ever gone through': How Fishlabs came back from the brink". MCV/Develop. Archived from the original on 9 February 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  17. ^ a b Sarkar, Samit (30 July 2014). "Deep Silver buys Homefront from Crytek, moves Homefront: The Revolution to new studio". Polygon. Archived from the original on 9 December 2018. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  18. ^ Sarkar, Samit (30 July 2014). "Homefront: The Revolution devs to move to Deep Silver as Crytek scales back two studios". Polygon. Archived from the original on 19 August 2018. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  19. ^ Dransfield, Ian (15 August 2018). "Timesplitters license acquired by Koch Media". MCV/Develop. Archived from the original on 9 February 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  20. ^ Wood, Austin (5 May 2020). "Red Faction, Painkiller, Risen and more get closer to home in THQ Nordic and Koch Media IP trade". GamesRadar+. Archived from the original on 16 May 2020. Retrieved 15 May 2020.
  21. ^ Makuch, Eddie (20 May 2021). "New TimeSplitters Game Coming From Original Developers". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 20 May 2021. Retrieved 20 May 2021.
  22. ^ Phillips, Tom. "TimeSplitters studio Free Radical Design closed today, staff say". Eurogamer. Archived from the original on 11 December 2023. Retrieved 11 December 2023.
  23. ^ Corriea, Alexa Ray (23 April 2013). "Dead Island: Riptide edition with severed torso statue still available in Europe, Australia". Polygon. Archived from the original on 2 February 2019. Retrieved 2 February 2019.
  24. ^ a b Parfitt, Ben (23 April 2013). "So Deep Silver went ahead and shipped the Dead Island Riptide Zombie Bait Edition regardless". MCV/Develop. Archived from the original on 9 February 2019. Retrieved 5 February 2019.
  25. ^ a b Williams, Mike (29 January 2019). "Metro Exodus' Sudden Switch to Epic Really is Unfair". USgamer. Archived from the original on 7 February 2019. Retrieved 5 February 2019.
  26. ^ a b Orland, Kyle (28 January 2019). "Epic Games Store snags Metro Exodus away from Steam [Updated]". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on 3 February 2019. Retrieved 5 February 2019.
  27. ^ Chalk, Andy (30 January 2019). "Players protest Epic's Metro Exodus exclusive by review-bombing the series on Steam". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 5 February 2019. Retrieved 5 February 2019.
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