Now this is a shock. Darrell Rodriguez, former President of the company, has left LucasArts today along with several members of his executive team. Kotaku reported the news, along with this note:
The moves, announced earlier today at a Lucasarts staff meeting, do not impact the company's development teams, or other aspects of its publishing business outside of the top brass.
I'll believe that when I see it. Traditionally a LucasArts president leaving coincides with a massive shift in their business plan, and a lot of cancellations and "staff reorganization".
Should we be afraid for Monkey Island 2: Special Edition? I wouldn't have thought so as that's pretty much in the can, doesn't cost anything in shipping materials and the first did really well. Other Special Editions though or re-releases we'll have to wait and see.
While the reasons for his departure are not known, like whether it was his choice or not, we can speculate. Since The Force Unleashed in 2008 LucasArts have not had a really killer game despite several in production, and have instead focused on "smaller" titles. Were the top brass at LucasArts annoyed at this? I bet they were. This is a real shame though, as those "smaller" titles included such things as an excellent new Monkey Island, long-wanted re-releases of old games, a new original game, and Special Editions of two games that have been crying out for SEs for years.
More as we get it. Despite messing up with Indiana Jones at the start, we'll miss you Darrell.
UPDATE 1: Apparently Darrell resigned, although there's not yet a reason why. Lucasfilm board member Jerry Bowerman (who has been high up at both EA and Sierra) will sit in the Emperor's chair until Grand Admiral Thrawn arrives to take over.
Source: Kotaku
Laserschwert
Who knows, maybe his next stop will be Sierra, until they re-release their adventure games...
Leave the speculation out, it's not constructive
Rodriguez did a lot of good things, as far as the Mojosphere was concerned anyway. Seeing a chunk of the management team is going with him, two likely reasons for him leaving would be: A) He got a better job and is taking his team to build the management portion of the organization from scratch, or B) The powers that be pushed him out.
If it was the latter, I suppose an episodic DOTT from TTG is out of the question. :~
I'm excited to see what happens next :D
Jim Ward was the one truly harmful LEC president in terms of profits I believe.
If I had to guess any reason for him being pressured into resigning it'd be that he hasn't let the company spew out crappy Star Wars games (which I'd imagine continue to be like cash cow faeces). But then he wasn't necessarily pressured — maybe he's doing a Will Wright and wants to start a new company with some of his key players.
Granted it's not like he was the most risky president in history, with refurbishing absolute classics being fairly high up the 'guaranteed success' ladder nowadays. But he recognised that compelling internal development and more original IP is the way to go if LucasArts is to survive the long haul, and I hope his replacement doesn't lose sight of that.
And no, worry about MI2 at this point would be silly, but the future of SEs is unclear.
EDIT: Cool, Mr.Schafer retweets Mojo
But seriously, No.