Relic Entertainment
CompanyCanada · Founded 1997
We are an award-winning developer of genre-defining games like Homeworld, Dawn of War, Company of Heroes, and Age of Empires. We have delivered rich, thoughtful strategy games throughout our history and our vision is to continue making games that people love to play.
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Each row is a game or company named alongside Relic Entertainment, each column a document, oldest first. A mark means that document names it. Select a row to see those documents.
About the company
- Founded
- 1997
- Country
- Canada
- Links
- Official site
Company data from IGDB.com
Documents about Relic Entertainment
2K Is the Only One That Could Take on EA Sports FC
Christopher Dring's Monday edition of The Game Business, now renamed "Here's The Dring" from "The Game Business Micro," argues that 2K is the only publisher with a realistic chance of challenging EA Sports FC.
- 2K Games has launched a new Vancouver-based studio, Small Axe Studios, specifically tasked with developing a new blockbuster sports franchise.
- The new studio is staffed by high-level industry veterans formerly of EA Sports, including leaders who worked on EA Sports FC, Madden, FIFA, UFC, and Skate.
- Small Axe Studios originated from the 2K Sports Lab, an internal research and development unit established by 2K in 2023.
Why Your Game Studio's Organizational Structure Is the Real Problem: Not Your Talent
The document argues that traditional, craft-based organizational structures are the primary cause of friction and failure in game development, not a lack of talent.
- Traditional game studio structures, organized by craft silos (e.g., separate design, engineering, art departments), create significant friction, leading to endless iteration, communication breakdowns, and features that miss their mark.
- The core problem in many game studios is organizational structure, not a lack of talent; optimizing for craft silos instead of outcomes leads to inefficiencies where handoffs lose fidelity and original intent.
- An 'outcome team' framework, consisting of small (5-9 people), cross-functional units with clear missions, success metrics, and authority, significantly outperforms traditional specialized departments, reducing iteration timelines from 6-12 months to 2-4 months.
Game Dev Teams Are Broken. Here's the Structure That Actually Works.
Modern game development frequently suffers from structural friction, where traditional craft-based silos impede progress and dilute creative intent.
- Studios should reorganize into autonomous, cross-functional teams of five to fifteen members to reduce communication overhead and accelerate iteration.
- Teams should be structured around specific product outcomes, such as combat mechanics or meta-systems, rather than traditional craft-based silos or task lists.
- Guilds must be established to facilitate cross-team knowledge sharing and maintain quality control while individual units operate with autonomy.
Life after Sega: Can Relic and Amplitude rejuvenate strategy games
Relic Entertainment and Amplitude Studios are navigating a pivotal transition following their departure from Sega, marking a broader industry shift toward independent agility within the strategy game sector.
- Relic Entertainment and Amplitude Studios have transitioned to independent operations following their departure from Sega to prioritize operational autonomy and community-focused development.
- Relic Entertainment is implementing a tiered production system that separates flagship titles from smaller, experimental projects under the 'Relic Labs' initiative to reduce financial risk and overhead.
- Amplitude Studios is maintaining its focus on the 4X strategy genre with a dedicated team of approximately 170 professionals, prioritizing deep engagement with its existing player base over mass-market expansion.
Curated Panel: International Collaboration – Success Comes With a Global Perspective.
International collaboration has become a fundamental necessity for modern game studios seeking to navigate the challenges of escalating production costs and the widening gap between development expenses and traditional pricing models.
- Modern game development requires a distributed model, as the scale of content demands—often requiring thousands of developers for a single title—makes single-location studios unsustainable.
- International collaboration mitigates financial risk by allowing studios to leverage proven, specialized partners rather than maintaining large, expensive internal teams.
- Successful international expansion requires a core group of local, high-level talent to set standards and maintain quality, while outsourcing specific work to global partners.
Marketing Jam Session
Successful game marketing hinges on the early integration of promotional strategy into the core development process.
- Integrate marketing strategy into the core development process early to ensure the game's mechanical and narrative pillars are inherently marketable.
- Establish a symbiotic relationship between marketing and development teams to ensure the final product maintains a cohesive and consistent identity.
- Utilize audience segmentation to tailor creative assets to specific player motivations, effectively highlighting distinct gameplay nuances for different groups.
Sega Sammy Fiscal Year Ended March 2024 Results Presentation
This is the English translation of SEGA SAMMY HOLDINGS' results presentation for the fiscal year ended March 2024, dated 2024/5/10, covering the group's Entertainment Contents, Pachislot & Pachinko Machines, Resort and Gaming businesses.
- Pachislot & Pachinko Machines operating income rose to 41.2 billion yen in FY2024/3 from 20.0 billion yen the prior year, while Entertainment Contents operating income declined to 28.9 billion yen in FY2024/3 from 38.7 billion yen the prior year.
- For FY2024/3, consolidated sales reached 467.8 billion yen and ordinary income 59.7 billion yen, while profit attributable to owners of parent decreased to 33.0 billion yen from 45.9 billion yen the prior year.
- Total shareholder returns were approximately 20.9 billion yen for FY2024/3, a total return ratio of 63.3%, including a 10.0 billion yen upper limit for treasury stock acquisition.
Over 1,000 Games Industry Professionals Lost Their Jobs in April 2024
The games industry experienced significant job losses in April 2024, with at least 1,003 professionals laid off. This figure represents a 132.7% increase compared to April 2023, when 431 layoffs were recorded.
- The video game industry saw at least 1,003 layoffs in April 2024, a 132.7% increase compared to the 431 job losses recorded in April 2023.
- Approximately 9,400 industry professionals have lost their jobs in the first four months of 2024, putting the sector on track to exceed the 10,500 total layoffs recorded throughout all of 2023.
- Take-Two Interactive drove the bulk of April's figures by cutting 600 positions as part of a restructuring strategy to reduce office footprints and cancel projects.
The Ultimate Game Dev's Guide to Working with Content Creators
This is an article from the a16z speedrun newsletter, published April 9, 2024, titled "The Ultimate Game Dev's Guide to Working with Content Creators."
- Arturo Castro says the Apex Legends launch approach of getting every big genre streamer to play on launch would not necessarily work today, citing that creators know their worth and switching costs are high.
- Riot Games used playtesting with creators over a period of years for 2XKO, with the aim of seeing whether the game resonated with the audience it targeted.
- Innersloth's Victoria Tran says creator goals tend to fall into three buckets: entertainment, reactions, and experiences.
Q1'24 Gaming Deals Report: The Dog Days Are Over
InvestGame's Q1'24 gaming deals report covers private investments, public offerings, and mergers and acquisitions in the video games industry, based on closed transactions tracked from public media, business partners and market insights.
- Excluding Epic Games' $1.5B raise from Disney, Q1'24 private investment capital deployed was 30% lower than Q1'23.
- Pre-Seed and Seed capital raised was about 3x the pre-pandemic quarterly level of roughly $30m, while Series A activity reached its lowest point in years.
- No significant gaming IPOs have taken place since mid-2022, and most public listings from 2020-2021 trade below their IPO prices.
Showtime: A Look Ahead to not-E3 2023
This document provides an analytical preview of the major gaming showcases anticipated during the "not-E3 2023" season, focusing on Microsoft, Sony, Ubisoft, and Summer Game Fest.
- Embracer Group's stock price plummeted by over 45% following the collapse of a $2 billion strategic partnership that had been in development for seven months.
- Ubisoft plans to increase the headcount of its Assassin’s Creed division by 40% over the next few years, building on an existing team of 2,000 employees.
- PlayStation Studios head Hermen Hulst has confirmed that Sony currently has a dozen live-service games in development.
Sons of the Forest: So Big It Broke Steam?
This analysis provides an overview of recent game sales performance and upcoming releases across PC (Steam, Epic Games Store), PlayStation, Xbox, Switch, and Meta Quest VR platforms, with a particular focus on major debuts in late February 2023.
- Hogwarts Legacy dominated the global market with 12 million units sold and $850 million in revenue, leading download charts across PlayStation, Xbox, and the Epic Games Store.
- Sons of the Forest achieved the year's second-largest Steam debut with 330,000 concurrent users, causing temporary storefront instability while maintaining an 88% positive rating.
- Atomic Heart and Company of Heroes 3 saw moderate PC success with 38,500 and 36,600 concurrent users respectively, though the latter faced mixed reviews due to technical issues.
Its games in the library
Company of HeroesRelic Entertainment · 200614- Company of Heroes 35
Age of Empires IVRelic Entertainment · 20219
League of LegendsRiot Games · 20091,236
Ultima OnlineOrigin Systems · 199770- Impossible Creatures2
Warhammer 40,000: Space MarineRelic Entertainment · 201137- Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War5
- Homeworld11