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Obsidian Entertainment, Inc. is an American video game developer based in Irvine, California. It was founded in June 2003, shortly before the closure of Black Isle Studios, by ex-Black Isle employees Feargus Urquhart, Chris Avellone, Chris Parker, Darren Monahan, and Chris Jones. Although they have created original intellectual property, many of their games are sequels based on licensed properties. Early projects included Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords and Neverwinter Nights 2, both sequels to BioWare-developed games. The team then developed their first original game, Alpha Protocol, in 2010. Other notable works from Obsidian include Fallout: New Vegas, Dungeon Siege III, and South Park: The Stick of Truth, all of which are also licensed properties. Throughout the studio's history, many projects—including Futureblight, Dwarfs, Aliens: Crucible, and Stormlands—were canceled. Due to having so many projects canceled, the company entered a severe financial crisis in 2012. As a result, Obsidian decided to crowdfund their next game, Pillars of Eternity, a role-playing game played from an isometric perspective, which ultimately became a success and saved the studio from closure. The team's focus then changed from developing licensed titles to creating original games based on the studio's own intellectual property, including a sequel to Pillars of Eternity. In November 2018, Obsidian Entertainment was acquired by Microsoft and became part of Xbox Game Studios. Their latest releases are the survival game Grounded and adventure game Pentiment. The studio is currently developing Avowed and The Outer Worlds 2. History 2003: Founding Obsidian Entertainment was founded by Feargus Urquhart, Chris Avellone, Chris Parker, Darren Monahan and Chris Jones on June 12, 2003. Prior to the establishment of Obsidian, they worked for Interplay Entertainment's subsidiary Black Isle Studios. At Black Isle they created several role-playing games including Icewind Dale, Planescape: Torment, and Fallout 2, and collaborated with BioWare on Neverwinter Nights, Baldur's Gate, and Baldur's Gate II. Most of these games were critically and commercially successful, but Interplay's financial situation was poor and the studio lost its license to produce Dungeons & Dragons-based games. This led to the cancellation of Baldur's Gate III: The Black Hound. Urquhart and most of the staff members were dissatisfied and frustrated with the cancellation, as the game had already been under development for a year and a half. Urquhart became convinced that staying at Black Isle was no longer a "viable option" for the team, and decided to leave the company. He was in his early thirties at the time, and thought that if he did not start a new company soon, he may become too old to do so. Urquhart officially left Interplay in 2003 with Avellone, Parker, Monahan, and Jones, and founded Obsidian Entertainment with them the same year. At the time of the company's establishment there were seven employees, including the company's five founders. Parker, Urquhart, and Monahan invested $100,000 to $125,000 into their newly founded company. When choosing the name of the company, they had prepared a short list of names for them to choose. The list included "Scorched Earth" and "Three Clown Software". The team eventually chose "Obsidian Entertainment", which they thought was strong, memorable, and felt similar to name of their old studio, Black Isle. Upon its establishment, the studio needed more capital in order to keep its operation running, and thus needed to gain support from publishers. They approached Electronic Arts, but it did not result in a project. The studio also contacted Ubisoft looking to make a Might & Magic game, but Ubisoft instead ended up contracting with Arkane Studios on that project, which became Dark Messiah of Might & Magic. Obsidian pitched a game to Take-Two Interactive called Futureblight, which was described as a Fallout-style game powered by the Neverwinter Nights engine. Similar to the EA and Ubisoft projects, Futureblight was never made. Late 2003–2008: Sequels to BioWare games Towards the end of 2003, the team was contacted by LucasArts president Simon Jeffrey, who requested that Obsidian make an action role-playing game set in the Star Wars universe. The team suggested a game concept which featured first-person lightsaber melee combat and that included established characters like R2-D2. Their idea was rejected, and Jeffrey instead asked Obsidian to create a follow-up to the BioWare-developed Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, as the team at Obsidian was familiar with the technology that the original game used. The partnership between the two companies finalized in late 2003, and development of the game, which became Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, began in October 2003. Obsidian was given 15 months to develop The Sith Lords. Originally set for a holiday 2004 release, LucasArts gave the studio an extension into 2005, before shifting the release date back to holiday 2004 following the Electronic Entertainment Expo. While LucasArts did dispatch members of its own staff to help get the game out on time, a number of features wound up being cut due to time constraints. Due to the moved deadline, Obsidian also did not have enough time to polish the game, and The Sith Lords suffered from crashes and other technical issues. Despite its issues, The Sith Lords was released to positive critical reception. The cut features were eventually restored by modders, who began their effort in 2009 and finished in 2012. From the beginning, the studio's goal was to be able to develop multiple projects simultaneously, and the decision led the company to expand very quickly. Soon after the development of The Sith Lords began, the team expanded to 20 employees. As of July 2004, it had expanded to 27, with 18 from Black Isle, and others from Blizzard Entertainment, Electronic Arts, Taldren, Totally Games, Treyarch, and Troika. Prior to the launch of The Sith Lords, Obsidian was approached by Atari. Atari acquired the license to produce Dungeons & Dragons-based games, and wanted Obsidian to create a sequel to Neverwinter Nights, which became Neverwinter Nights 2. Development of the game began in July 2005 with a team of ten people. The development of the game was headed by Monahan and Avellone. Obsidian became the game's lead developer, while Neverwinter Nights creator BioWare provided technical assistance. While they were developing the game, the team's size grew to about 50 people. The team were given sufficient time for the game's development, and Atari was willing to delay the project's targeted release window from Christmas 2005 to October 31, 2006. Neverwinter Nights 2 received a generally positive critical reception. Two expansions, Mask of the Betrayer and Storm of Zehir, were released in 2007 and 2008. During Neverwinter Nights 2's devel.... Discover the Chris Jones popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Chris Jones books.