Visceral Games, previously known as EA Redwood Shores, was an American video game studio owned by Electronic Arts. The studio is best known for creating and mainly developing the Dead Space series. It also helped create the Tiger Woods PGA Tour games from 1999 to 2006.
History
In 1998, Electronic Arts (EA) moved from San Mateo, California to a new corporate headquarters in Redwood Shores, California. At this location, EA founded a studio named EA Redwood Shores, which operated under the EA Games division.
EA Redwood Shores's first game was Future Cop: LAPD, released in 1998. From 1998 to 2008, the studio mostly created games based on movies and other existing properties. According to designers Ben Wanat and Wright Bagwell, EA was not interested in creating original ideas during this time. However, the studio wanted to make a sequel to System Shock, and Vice President and General Manager Glen Schofield tried to convince EA's leaders to allow this. Although they had some ideas for the game, the plan changed in 2005 after Capcom released Resident Evil 4, which was very successful. This success helped Schofield persuade EA to let the studio create a new game, which became Dead Space.
Dead Space received good reviews, leading the studio to be renamed Visceral Games in 2009. At this time, the studio became its own division under EA, focusing on making third-person action games similar to Dead Space. Alongside this change, two sister studios were created: Visceral Montreal in Montreal, Quebec, and Visceral Melbourne in Melbourne, Australia.
In 2009, Visceral announced a game called The Ripper, inspired by Jack the Ripper. However, The Ripper was canceled, possibly as early as 2009. Industry rumors suggested that a related project, Blood Dust, was being developed at Visceral Melbourne before the cancellation. Visceral Melbourne closed on September 19, 2011.
In 2010, Dante's Inferno, inspired by the Divine Comedy, was released but received mixed reviews. The studio then returned to the Dead Space series with Dead Space 2, released in 2011. This sequel also received good reviews, but in 2017, it was reported that the game was financially unsuccessful for EA. Former level designer Zach Wilson estimated that the game cost about $47 million to develop and market, but only sold 4 million copies.
Visceral continued working on Dead Space 3, aiming to follow the style of the first game. However, EA expressed concerns about this approach and pushed the team to add co-operative play to the game. Wanat noted that EA wanted the game to move faster and appeal to a broader audience, which was different from the horror-focused roots of the series. Though Dead Space 3 received mostly positive reviews when released in 2013, it sold far fewer copies than Dead Space 2. In 2013, EA's VP Patrick Söderlund said that while the Dead Space franchise was valued, Visceral was not working on a fourth title and instead focused on two new projects.
Visceral was also working on Army of Two: The Devil's Cartel with Visceral Montreal. In February 2013, EA closed Visceral Montreal entirely. One of the new projects Visceral started in 2013 was Battlefield Hardline, a "Cops and Robbers" variation of previous Battlefield games. A smaller team also began working on a pirate-themed game called Jamaica.
In early 2013, Disney acquired Lucasfilm and shut down its game studio, LucasArts. EA quickly partnered with Disney to develop Star Wars games through three of its studios, including Visceral. Around the same time, Ubisoft released Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag, also a pirate-themed game. EA canceled Jamaica in favor of a Star Wars game. Visceral proposed a third-person action game set in a Star Wars universe, featuring "space scoundrels" in an open-world setting. This project was code-named Yuma. Amy Hennig, a writer from Naughty Dog known for the Uncharted series, joined Visceral to help develop the story. Later, the project's concept changed to focus on a large-scale heist, and it was renamed Ragtag.
In 2017, EA decided to close Visceral on October 17. The Star Wars game was reassigned to EA Worldwide Studios, led by EA Vancouver, with plans to revamp its gameplay. The closure of Visceral was seen as a sign that publishers were becoming less interested in making strictly single-player games, as many of Visceral's projects had been. EA's CEO, Andrew Wilson, stated that the closure was not due to a preference for multiplayer games but because the company wanted to follow player feedback and market trends. He explained that the design of Ragtag did not fit these changes, and moving the project to another studio was necessary to "pivot the design."