Report: Terminal Reality closed

Terminal Reality, the studio behind the original BloodRayne and Walking Dead: Survival Instinct, has reportedly shut down.

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The Texas-based studio Terminal Reality appears to have shut down, after a long period of silence. The developer was best known for Walking Dead: Survival Instinct, Ghostbusters: The Video Game, and the original BloodRayne.

Gamasutra reports that the studio's site has been inactive, instead linking to its Facebook page that hasn't been updated since October. Whatever caused the studio to go quiet came to a head yesterday, when 10-year veteran Jesse Sosa wrote on his personal Facebook page that the studio "seems to have finally shut down." Other employees in his Facebook comments don't seem to contradict his story, but no official details have been released regarding the closure.

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  • reply
    December 13, 2013 7:00 AM

    Steve Watts posted a new article, Report: Terminal Reality closed.

    Terminal Reality, the studio behind the original BloodRayne and Walking Dead: Survival Instinct, has reportedly shut down.

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      December 13, 2013 7:34 AM

      Sad. Terminal Velocity was a great game, back in the day...

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        December 13, 2013 7:41 AM

        [deleted]

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        December 13, 2013 8:28 AM

        One of the first games that I played on my first PC, played it to death.

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        December 13, 2013 8:57 AM

        Yeah loved that with my sidewinder...

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        December 13, 2013 11:08 AM

        I miss playing it online over Mplayer. And the radio taunt, "yeah, your mom". For some reason that was hilarious to 13 year old me.

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          December 13, 2013 11:46 AM

          I played mainly against my brothers. It didn't have the desired effect.

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      December 13, 2013 7:42 AM

      I will now mourn the loss of Demonik, as I watch Grandma's Boy.

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      December 13, 2013 8:32 AM

      Oh man, they were monster truck madness? So many memories!

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      December 13, 2013 8:41 AM

      It's easy to remember these guys for TWD: Survival Instinct and that horrendous Kinect Star Wars game that still gives me post-traumatic stress nightmares to this day. But still, these guys made one of the few competent Ghostbusters games and for that alone, they deserve our respect. Let's pour one out for these guys.

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        December 13, 2013 8:46 AM

        "Competent"? From what I heard, it was buggy as hell.

        Terminal Velocity back in 1995 was awesome. If I'm going to remember them, it's for that.

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          December 13, 2013 8:49 AM

          [deleted]

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          December 13, 2013 8:59 AM

          The Ghostbusters game wasn't buggy. I played it on the 360 and the PS3 and neither one had any technical problems that I recall. I think the PS3 version ran at a slightly lower visual quality, but I wouldn't call that a bug really. Multiplayer was kinda broken (which was a shame 'cause it was fun), but Terminal Reality didn't do that mode. The PC port has some issues as well, but it was a port and again, not done by TR.

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          December 13, 2013 9:43 AM

          "heard"

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          December 13, 2013 10:32 AM

          [deleted]

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        December 13, 2013 9:37 AM

        I prefer to remember them for all the Terminal Velocity clone games, since that was their original wheelhouse. I never played Nocturne or Fly, but those were from better times as well.

        I feel like the wheels started to come off after the Ghostbusters: Sanctum of Slime game, where they seemed to be helping out on other games (Def Jam Rapstars, Kinect Star Wars) instead of having their own project. It almost seems like another scenario that fits into 2011-era CliffyB's "Death of the AA studio" theory, where it's unsustainable to have a studio with 50 people or less, with significant talent wage costs, and remain independent. Even more so if there's engine talent, as Terminal Reality had. Most of those studios have been bought by a publisher, gone "full-on indie" making Steam and/or free-to-play games, or have tried to sustain themselves with things like Kinect game contracts, or IP tie-ins (Terminal Reality did both of these).

        The remaining studios like this that come to my mind are Obsidian, Rebellion, and Ruffian. Obsidian kickstarted a game; I'll have to read about how Ruffian and Rebellion are doing.

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      December 13, 2013 9:04 AM

      I enjoyed their Ghostbusters game, despite it's flaws. Definitely worthy of the 8/10 it got.

      So I guess Epic is the only one of the old Gathering of Developer guys still around?

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        December 13, 2013 9:51 AM

        Epic wasn't in Gathering of Developers. GoD was Mike Wilson and the business head guy who started Terminal Velocity, right?

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          December 13, 2013 9:55 AM

          According to the Wiki, Epic was. Founding Developers: Ritual Entertainment, Epic Games, 3D Realms, PopTop Software, Terminal Reality, Edge of Reality.

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            December 13, 2013 12:27 PM

            That's just for Jazz Jackrabbit II. Unreal and UT were published by GT; Epic had their fingers in both pies.

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      December 13, 2013 9:55 AM

      Nocturne and Bloodrayne I think are the only 2 games I ever played from these guys, I forgot they were even still around

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        December 13, 2013 11:27 AM

        Bloodrayne is one of those games that I remember playing, and enjoying, but today I could not tell you why I thought it was good.

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      December 13, 2013 11:23 AM

      Now I'm listening to this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyDXtMzMjSE

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      December 13, 2013 6:36 PM

      Sad to see another developer close if that is what happened here (versus a slow bleed of people making whatever happened this week a formality). Hope everyone lands on their feet. Not sure what the scene is like in Dallas currently, but there are still opportunities in Austin (and lots of things afoot) if people are trying to stay relatively local.

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      December 13, 2013 6:40 PM

      Wearing my TRI shirt today in memorandum

      https://twitter.com/RiotSamizul/status/411620104166600704/photo/1

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