| Looking Glass Studios | |
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| Type | Defunct |
| Founded | 1990 |
| Headquarters | Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States |
| Key people | Paul Neurath (co-founder) Ned Lerner (co-founder) Doug Church |
| Industry | Interactive entertainment |
Looking Glass Studios was a computer game development company during the 1990s. The company originally formed as Looking Glass Technologies, when Blue Sky Productions and Lerner Research merged. Their games were regarded for demonstrating innovative gameplay, pioneering physics simulation, and well-written, engaging stories. However, many of their games, despite wide critical acclaim, sold poorly in comparison to contemporary rivals. Their best known games series were Ultima Underworld, System Shock, and Thief. In 1997, the company merged with Intermetrics, Inc [1]. The company went out of business on May 24, 2000 during a financial crisis related to their publisher at the time, Eidos Interactive. Originally based in Lexington, Massachusetts, in 1994 the company moved to Cambridge. A significant number of Looking Glass personnel were MIT graduates. Looking Glass also had satellite offices in Austin, TX and Redmond, Washington [2].
People
After the company folded, people from Looking Glass went on to work at Ion Storm, Irrational Games, Harmonix, Mad Doc Software, Arkane Studios and to found Floodgate Entertainment and Digital Eel, amongst other later studios. Ion Storm developed Thief: Deadly Shadows, the third game in the Thief franchise. Arkane Studios went on to develop Arx Fatalis, a dungeon crawling game that bore heavy resemblance to Looking Glass' cult series Ultima Underworld, and Dark Messiah of Might and Magic. Ex-Looking Glass personnel have worked on such games as Deus Ex, Guitar Hero, Half-Life 2, Freedom Force, The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, Fallout 3, Bioshock, Empire Earth II and Star Trek: Armada II among others. The following people worked on projects with Looking Glass Studios (by no means an all-inclusive list):
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List of titles
- F-22 Interceptor for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis (1991)
- Ultima Underworld: The Stygian Abyss (1992)
- Car and Driver (1992)
- John Madden Football '93 for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis (1992)
- Ultima Underworld II: Labyrinth of Worlds (1993)
- System Shock (1994)
- Flight Unlimited (1995)
- Terra Nova: Strike Force Centauri (1996)
- British Open Championship Golf (1997)
- Flight Unlimited II (1997)
- Thief: The Dark Project (1998)
- Thief Gold (1999)
- Command & Conquer for the Nintendo 64 (1999)
- System Shock 2 (1999) (assisting Irrational Games)
- Flight Unlimited III (1999)
- Destruction Derby 64 for the Nintendo 64 (1999)
- Thief II: The Metal Age (2000)
- Flight Combat: Thunder Over Europe (in development when company folded)
External links
- Looking Glass Studios profile from MobyGames
- An illustrated history of Looking Glass Studios from the-nextlevel.com
- To all the fans and supporters of LookingGlass: Final message from Looking Glass Studios website, from Archive.org
- Article on the closure of Looking Glass from IGN PC
- Through The Looking Glass: Honoring the Legacy of Looking Glass Studios from TTLG.com
- "Reasons for the Fall: A Post-Mortem On Looking Glass Studios" from TTLG.com
- Final Days a photographic tribute to LGS employees, particularly on the last day of the company's existence
