Lionhead Studios Ltd.
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LionHead Studios was founded by Peter Molyneux, Mark Webley, Tim Rance and Steve Jackson in July 1997, coming from Bullfrog Productions. The company was headquartered in Surrey, England.
Around 2000, the company started offering companies to become a Lionhead satellite studio, to work on games under guidance of Lionhead as a main company:
- Big Blue Box Studios (eventually merged into Lionhead)
- Intrepid Computer Entertainment Ltd. (until October 2004)
- Black & White Studios (separate division, not really a satellite studio)
So far, the company has worked with three franchises: the strategical god games in the Black & White series, the Fable RPGs, and the creative film industry simulation The Movies.
On 6th April 2006, the company was acquired by Microsoft Game Studios. Since then, the Fable franchise has been continued with Fable II in October 2008.
In January 2012 CTO Tim Rance left the company to establish the game development studio 22 Cans. In March of that year Peter Molyneux announced to follow him there. They work together with Peter Murphy, who also was with Lionhead until around 2008.
On 7th March 2016 Microsoft announced that development on Fable Legends was ceased and a proposed closure was confirmed. It was officially closed on 29th April 2016.
Credited on 11 Games from 2001 to 2014
| Fable: Anniversary (2014 on Windows, Xbox 360, Xbox One...) |
| Fable: The Journey (2012 on Xbox 360) |
| Fable: Heroes (2012 on Xbox 360) |
| Fable III (2010 on Windows, Xbox 360, Xbox One...) |
| Fable II (2008 on Xbox 360, Xbox Cloud Gaming, Xbox One) |
| Fable II: Pub Games (2008 on Xbox 360) |
| The Movies (2005 on Windows, Macintosh) |
| Black & White 2 (2005 on Windows, Macintosh) |
| Fable: The Lost Chapters (2005 on Windows, Xbox, Macintosh) |
| Fable (2004 on Xbox, Xbox 360) |
| Black & White (2001 on Windows, Macintosh) |
History +
- April 6th, 2006
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Company acquired by Microsoft Game Studios.
- December 4th, 2004
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The gamecube game Unity is cancelled. They either had to do a rush job or risk not finding a publisher anymore when finishing it properly. It was supposed to be an innovative light and sound game with psychedelic environments. Jeff Minter, from Tempest 2000, was working on the game.
- October 4th, 2004
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BC, a prehistoric human management game with dinosaurs and a race to stay on top on the evolutionary ladder, is put on hold. The Xbox game was under development at Intrepid Games, a part of Lionhead. They even already announced a sequel with Xbox Live! support in July 2004.
- June 2004
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Ronald Millar and Chris Millar, former Blizzard and Jaleco employees, join Lionhead Studios.
- July 1997
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Lionhead Studios founded by Peter Molyneux
Trivia +
The logo was designed by Evie Mclaughlin, the wife of Art Lead Paul Mclaughlin at the company.
They came up with the name Lionhead because it was the name of Mark Webley's hamster; which died one week before the company was founded.
The official game website was http://www.lionhead.co.uk
Related Web Sites +
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Wikipedia: Lionhead Studios
article in the open encyclopedia -
Lionhead: The inside story
a detailed company profile on Eurogamer (12th May 2016)
Frequent Collaborators
- 8 games with Microsoft Corporation
- 8 games with Xbox Game Studios
- 5 games with ak tronic Software & Services GmbH
- 4 games with NBG EDV Handels- und Verlags GmbH
- 4 games with Feral Interactive Ltd.
- 3 games with Robosoft Technologies Pvt. Ltd
- 3 games with Epic Games Tools LLC
- 3 games with MacGameStore, LLP
- 3 games with Valve Corporation
- 3 games with Application Systems Heidelberg Software GmbH
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