A Sad Story

[Sir Perceval of Daventry]

I read this over at IA....If true, it's very sad and frustrating, and would explain a lot....

"[The end of Sierra] was actually much worse than anybody ever let on to.  As the family member of a former Sierra employee, I witnessed it first hand.

None of Sierra's competitors had the capabilities to take on Sierra financially, which was the only option.  AOL, EA and Activision all got together, banded against Sierra, and lost (this was all outlined briefly in the fraud charges against the CUC members).  So, their plan b was to bring in a conglomerate that had virtually limitless amounts of money - this was found in CUC, on paper anyway.

CUC approached Sierra with the deal of a lifetime, from the eyes of the share holders.  Even though Ken didn't want to give it up, he wasn't left much choice as the share holders would have ultimately dumped their shares of Sierra had the deal gone south unless he could have proven that it was all a fraud (he had nothing showing that data at the time, obviously).  Which would have damaged and possibly destroyed Sierra anyway although they had plenty of cash on hand.

The goal of those involved was to dismantle Sierra, ruin its reputation and software pieces, and then make it go away --and they did just that.  They ruined the franchises - post acquisition, it was quite obvious that different developers had their hands in it, and that their hearts nor imaginations were in it as was the case with prior versions of the software pieces.

Now look at who holds what little remains of Sierra (the name and IP)... Their number 1 competitor at the time.  They've held on to all things Sierra very firmly, threatening anybody and everybody who attempts to do anything with the ancient software pieces.  Making certain that none of Sierra's franchises are resurrected aside from those that did not transfer into their hands upon their final acquisition of what little remains, in which they have no control.

It's disheartening to say the least.  The plan that was executed and carried out thoroughly.  And unfortunately, it wrecked the lives of over a thousand people, as well as the economy of the small town of Oakhurst, CA, which has not fully recovered to date.

At one point, Ken even admitted he regretted going public with Sierra, as remaining private would have stopped these events from taking place - no share holders to please."

http://www.infamous-adventures.com/forum/index.php?topic=3578.0

It'd explain why of the game companies CUC bought, only Sierra ceased to exist; It'd explain also why for example when development teams were assembled to make a new Space Quest and King's Quest game back in 2002, upper management ordered the developers not to even LOOK at any previous games or reference them in any way. It'd explain why those planned games were basically a slap in the face to what the original games were. It'd explain why every attempt at either corporate or creative advise or help by Ken Williams, Al Lowe and other Sierra designers and officials was repeatedly rejected or totally ignored by every company which held the Sierra IP.

It'd explain why Sierra was the sole game company used in CUC's illegal dealings (Blizzard's and Knowledge Adventure's names were not), which shattered Sierra's profitability and destroyed the 401Ks of most longtime employees. It'd explain the unending series of corporate restructurings,  lay-offs and general chaos which began almost as soon as Sierra was bought, which ripped apart the company from within while it was at it's fiscal peak (Sierra was the market share leader in the software business in 1996); Why Ken Williams was blocked out of running Sierra and phased out of major game decisions to the point that he felt the need to leave the game business entirely rather than watch and sit by as his company was ripped apart, not being able to do anything....It'd explain a lot of why it seemed someone "had it out" against Sierra, really.

[GrahamRocks!]

...Wow, Chainsaw Monday was worse than I thought. That IS sad!

[dark-daventry]

This is far worse than I ever thought. I never knew it was *this* bad. I always knew there was more to it than what the public knew, but this is just on a scale I never thought possible. How depressing. My memories of Sierra's games are now that much more special and precious.

[snabbott]

I'm a bit skeptical - we don't even know who this person is. It sounds rather conspiracy theory-ish to me. I'm not saying it's not true, just that I'm not taking it at face value.

If it is true, though, it is indeed very sad.

[Bludshot]

I agree with snabbott.  Anyone could've written that.

Not that EA wasn't the scourge of some great devs back then.