The story
Founded by George Lucas on May 1982.1
Early history
In 1979, George Lucas wanted to explore other areas of entertainment and created the Lucasfilm Computer Division in 1979, which included a department for computer games (the Games Group) and another for graphics. The graphics department was spun off into its own corporation in 1986, ultimately becoming Pixar.
The Lucasfilm Games Group originally cooperated with Atari, Inc., which helped fund the video game group's founding, to produce video games. Though the group had spun out of Lucasfilm, the video game development license for Lucasfilm's Star Wars was held by Atari at the time, forcing the group to start with original concepts; Ron Gilbert, one of the group's first employees, believed that if the Lucasfilm Games Group had the rights for Star Wars from the start, they would have never branched into any new intellectual property.
The first products from the Games Group were Ballblazer and Rescue on Fractalus!, developed in 1984 for the Atari 5200 console and Atari 8-bit computers. Beta versions of both games were leaked to pirate bulletin boards exactly one week after Atari had received unprotected copies for a marketing review, and were in wide circulation over a year before the original release date. Planned to be released in the 3rd quarter of 1984 under the Atari/Lucasfilm label, the games were delayed when Warner Communications sold the assets of the consumer division of Atari, Inc. to Jack Tramiel in July of that year, and were ultimately picked up by publisher Epyx and released by May 1985. Lucasfilm's next two games were Koronis Rift and The Eidolon. Their first games were only developed by Lucasfilm, and a publisher would distribute the games. Atari published their games for Atari systems, Activision and Epyx would do their computer publishing. Maniac Mansion was the first game to be published and developed by Lucasfilm Games.
The early charter of Lucasfilm Games was to make experimental, innovative, and technologically advanced video games. Habitat, an early online role-playing game and one of the first to support a graphical front-end, was one such title. It was only released as a beta test in 1986 by Quantum Link, an online service for the Commodore 64. Quantum Link could not provide the bandwidth at the time to support the game, so the full Habitat was never released outside of the beta test. However, Lucasfilm Games recouped the cost of development by releasing a sized-down version called Club Caribe in 1988. Lucasfilm later licensed the software to Fujitsu, who released it in Japan as Fujitsu Habitat in 1990. Fujitsu later licensed Habitat for world-wide distribution, and released an updated version called WorldsAway in 1995. The latest iteration of Habitat is still called WorldsAway, which can be found at MetroWorlds.
Initially, the Games Group worked from Lucas' Skywalker Ranch near Nicasio, California. In 1990, in a reorganization of the Lucas companies, the Games Division of Lucasfilm became part of the newly created LucasArts Entertainment Company, which also comprised Industrial Light & Magic and Skywalker Sound. Later ILM and Skywalker Sound were consolidated in Lucas Digital Ltd. and LucasArts became the official name of the former Games Division. During this, the division had moved out of Skywalker Ranch to near-by offices in San Rafael, California.
Also in 1990, LucasArts started to publish The Adventurer, their own gaming magazine where one could read about their upcoming games and interviews with the developers. The final issue was published in 1996.
In the same year, Lucas Learning was created as a subsidiary of LucasArts, providing educational software for classrooms.
iMUSE
iMUSE (Interactive MUsic Streaming Engine) is an interactive music system used in a number of LucasArts video games. It synchronizes music with the visual action in the game, and transitions from one musical theme to another. iMUSE was developed in the early 1990s by composers Michael Land and Peter McConnell while working at LucasArts. The iMUSE system is patented by LucasArts, and was added to the SCUMM game engine in 1991. The first game to use iMUSE was Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge and it has been used in all LucasArts adventure games since. It has also been used for some non-adventure LucasArts titles, including Star Wars: X-Wing (DOS version), Star Wars: TIE Fighter (DOS version), and Star Wars: Dark Forces.
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Action side-scrolling games
Lucasfilm Games also released several side-scrollers during the Lucasarts era, focusing primarily on run and gun gameplay. A trilogy of games under the name of Super Star Wars for the SNES, with each game based on each of the three films from the Star Wars original trilogy: Super Star Wars (1992), Super Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back (1993) and Super Star Wars: Return of the Jedi (1994). An Indiana Jones game based on the first three films of the franchise titled Indiana Jones' Greatest Adventures (1994) was developed alongside Factor 5, the first of many joint collaborations between the two studios.
They also released some games not based on their existing IPs. Zombies Ate My Neighbors (1993) and its sequel Ghoul Patrol (1994) were overhead run and gun side-scrollers inspired by classic 1950s Horror B-movies. A spiritual successor called Herc's Adventures was released in 1997 and was inspired by Greek mythology. Metal Warriors (1995), a side-scroller inspired by mecha anime, and Big Sky Trooper were also developed using the same engine as Zombies Ate My Neighbors. Though these games sold poorly, they later garnered a cult following and are now considered to be Cult Classics from the 16-Bit era.
Adventure games
The first adventure game developed by Lucasfilm Games was Labyrinth in 1986, based on the Lucasfilm movie of the same name. The 1987 title Maniac Mansion introduced SCUMM, the scripting language behind most of the company's later adventure offerings. The adventures released in the following years, such as Zak McKracken and the Alien Mindbenders in 1988, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure in 1989, and the 1990 titles Loom and The Secret of Monkey Island helped Lucasfilm Games build a reputation as one of the leading developers in the genre. The original five adventure games created with SCUMM were released in a compilation titled LucasArts Classic Adventures in 1992.
LucasArts was often referred to as one of the two big names in the field, competing with Sierra On-line as a developer of high quality adventures. The first half of the 1990s was the heyday for the company's adventure fame, with classic titles such as Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge in 1991, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis in 1992, Maniac Mansion: Day of the Tentacle and Sam & Max Hit the Road in 1993, and the 1995 titles Full Throttle and The Dig.
In the latter half of the decade, the popularity of adventure games faded and the costs associated with game development increased as high-resolution art and C.D.-quality audio became standard fare. The PC market wanted titles that would show off expensive new graphics cards to best effect, a change replicated in the home console market as the 3D capabilities of the PlayStation, Sega Saturn and Nintendo 64 dictated the nature of the majority of games produced for those platforms. The adventure genre failed to find popularity with the masses of new gamers.
Despite their declining popularity, LucasArts still continued to release adventure titles. In 1997, The Curse of Monkey Island, the last LucasArts adventure game to retain traditional two-dimensional graphics and point-and-click interface, was released. This was followed by Grim Fandango in 1998, LucasArts' first attempt to convert a 2D adventure to a 3D environment. The highly stylised visuals, outstanding soundtrack, superb voice acting and sophisticated writing earned Grim Fandango many plaudits, including GameSpot's Game of the Year award. Escape from Monkey Island (2000), the fourth installment in the Monkey Island series, featured the same control scheme as Grim Fandango, and was generally well received. It is the last original adventure game the company has released.
Two sequels to existing franchises, Full Throttle: Hell on Wheels and Sam & Max: Freelance Police, were announced to be in development but these projects were cancelled, in 2003 and 2004 respectively, before the games were finished. When the rights to the Sam & Max franchise expired in 2005, the creator of Sam & Max, Steve Purcell, regained ownership. He then licensed Sam & Max to Telltale Games to be developed into an episodic game. Telltale Games was made up primarily of former LucasArts employees who had worked on the Sam & Max sequel and were let go after the project was canceled.
LucasArts halted adventure game development for the next five years, focusing instead on their Star Wars games. They remained silent and did not rerelease their old games on digital distribution platforms, as other studios were doing at the time. However, in 2002, the company pledged that at least 50% of its releases would have nothing to do with Star Wars. It was not until 2009 that they returned to the genre. On June 1, 2009, LucasArts announced both The Secret of Monkey Island Special Edition, a high-definition remake of the original game with revised graphics, music and voice work, and Tales of Monkey Island, a new episodic installment in the Monkey Island series that was developed by Telltale Games.
Then, on July 6, 2009, they announced that they would be rereleasing a number of their classic games, including Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis and LOOM, on Steam. The rereleases were, for the first time, native versions built for Microsoft Windows. This was the first time in many years that the studio had offered any support for its classic adventure titles.
The second game in the Monkey Island series also received a high-definition remake, entitled Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge Special Edition in 2010. Both Monkey Island special edition games were released in a compilation, Monkey Island Special Edition Collection, exclusively in Europe in 2011.
The release of the unofficial SCUMM virtual machine, ScummVM, has led to a resurgence for LucasArts adventure games among present-day gamers. Using ScummVM, legacy adventure titles can easily be run on modern computers and even more unusual platforms such as video game consoles, mobile phones and PDAs.
Simulation games
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Lucasfilm Games developed a series of military vehicle simulation games, the first of which were the naval simulations PHM Pegasus in 1986 and Strike Fleet in 1987. These two titles were published by Electronic Arts for a variety of computer platforms, including IBM PC compatibles, Commodore 64 and Apple II.
In 1988, Battlehawks 1942 launched a trilogy of World War II air combat simulations, giving the player a chance to fly as an American or Japanese pilot in the Pacific Theater. Battlehawks 1942 was followed by Their Finest Hour: The Battle of Britain in 1989, recreating the battle between the Luftwaffe and RAF for Britain's air supremacy. The trilogy ended with Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe in 1991, in which the player could choose to fly on either the American or German side. The trilogy was lauded for its historical accuracy and detailed supplementary material—Secret Weapons of the Luftwaffe, for instance, was accompanied by a 224-page historical manual. The World War II trilogy was released with cover art by illustrator Marc Ericksen, in a compilation titled Air Combat Classics in 1994.
The World War II trilogy was created by a team led by Lawrence Holland, a game designer who later founded Totally Games. Totally Games would continue to develop games almost exclusively to LucasArts for a decade, with the most noted outcome of the symbiosis being the X-Wing series. They were also responsible for LucasArts' 2003 return to the aerial battles of World War II with Secret Weapons Over Normandy, a title released on PlayStation 2, Xbox and PC.
In 1996, LucasArts released Afterlife, a simulator in which players build their own Heaven and Hell, with several jokes and puns (such as a prison in Hell called San Quentin Tarantino).
First Star Wars games
Even though LucasArts had created games based on other Lucasfilm properties before (Labyrinth, Indiana Jones), they did not use the Star Wars license until the early 1990s, as it had been held by Broderbund before reverting to Lucasfilm in 1992. The first in-house development was the space combat simulator X-Wing, developed by Larry Holland's independent team, which went on to spawn a successful series.
The CD-ROM-only Star Wars game Rebel Assault became one of the biggest successes of the company and was considered a killer app for CD-ROM drives in the early 1990s.
First-person shooters
After the unprecedented success of id Software's Doom, the PC gaming market shifted towards production of three-dimensional first person shooters. LucasArts contributed to this trend with the 1995 release of Star Wars: Dark Forces, a first person shooter that successfully transplanted the Doom formula to a Star Wars setting. The Dark Forces Strategy guide claims that development was well underway before Doom was released and that the game was pushed back once Doom hit shelves so that it could be polished. The game was well received and spawned a new franchise: the Jedi Knight games. This began with the sequel to Dark Forces, Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II released in 1997; this game reflected the changing face of PC gaming, being one of the first games to appreciably benefit when used in conjunction with a dedicated 3D graphics card like 3dfx's Voodoo range. The game received an expansion pack, Mysteries of the Sith, in 1998 and a full sequel in 2002 with Star Wars Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast. 2003's Star Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy can be seen as a spin-off from the series, but was less well received by reviewers, who complained that the franchise was becoming formulaic.
Apart from Star Wars-themed 3D shooters, LucasArts also created the western-themed game Outlaws in 1997 and Armed and Dangerous (in collaboration with Planet Moon Studios) in 2003.
In the new millennium
In 2000, Simon Jeffery became the LucasArts president. He was president of LucasArts until 2003 and some successful Star Wars games released during his management like Star Wars Jedi Knight 2: Jedi Outcast, Star Wars Rogue Squadron 2, Knights of the Old Republic, Star Wars Jedi Academy and Star Wars Galaxies. Development of some other successful Star Wars Games began during his management, like Star Wars Republic Commando and Star Wars Battlefront.
In April 2000, LucasArts signed a two-year international distribution deal with Activision for over 45 territories across the world including the United Kingdom. The company previously signed a two-year deal with Activision for distribution in select European territories in April 1998. The deal was extended in May 2003 and renewed again in March 2009.
In 2002, LucasArts recognized that the over-reliance on Star Wars was reducing the quality of its output, and announced that future releases would be at least 50% non-Star Wars-related. However, many of the original titles were either unsuccessful or even cancelled before release, and since then LucasArts again had mainly Star Wars titles in production.
Also in 2002, LucasArts released a compilation CD filled with music from their past games. The album is titled The Best of LucasArts Original Soundtracks and features music from the Monkey Island series, Grim Fandango, Outlaws, and The Dig.
2003 saw the fruitful collaboration of LucasArts and BioWare on the well reviewed role-playing game, Knights of the Old Republic. Combining modern 3D graphics with high-quality storytelling and a sophisticated role-playing game system, this game reinvigorated the Star Wars franchise. Its 2004 sequel Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords continued in the same vein, but LucasArts was criticized for forcing the developer Obsidian Entertainment to release the sequel unfinished, resulting in a significant amount of cut content, a disappointing ending and numerous bugs. 2003 also saw the release of Gladius, a gladiator Tactical RPG that was positively received but sold poorly and was even rated as one of the "best Xbox games most people never played" by Official Xbox Magazine.
In 2003, LucasArts and the Star Wars franchise also branched out in a new direction—the world of the MMORPG, with the creation of Star Wars Galaxies. After a successful launch, the first expansion, Jump to Lightspeed, was released in 2004. The new expansion featured the addition of real-time space combat. This was continued in Rage of the Wookiees, an additional expansion which added an additional planet for users to explore. Also, a new expansion, Trials of Obi-Wan was released on November 1, 2005, consisting of several new missions focusing on the Episode 3 planet, Mustafar. While Star Wars Galaxies still retained a devoted following, it also alienated many players. Star Wars Galaxies chose to ignore the timeline established in the original films, during which the game is set, and also allowed players to play as Jedi characters. The game also underwent several major redesigns, which were received with mixed reactions by players.
Restructuring under Jim Ward
In April 2004, Jim Ward, V.P. of marketing, online and global distributions at Lucasfilm, was appointed president of LucasArts. Ward performed a top-to-bottom audit of LucasArts infrastructure, describing the company's state as "quite a mess." In 2003, LucasArts had reportedly grossed just over $100,000,000 according to N.P.D., primarily from its Star Wars titles — significantly less than the grosses from the year's top single titles such as Halo. Ward produced a five-year investment plan to refit the company. Previous Star Wars games had been produced by external developers such as Raven Software, BioWare and Obsidian; Ward now prioritized making LucasArts' internal game development work effectively and adapt to the evolving game industry. Star Wars: Battlefront, Star Wars: Republic Commando, and Star Wars: Episode III survived cuts that closed down other in-development games and reduced staff from about 450 to 190 employees.
Ward also canceled Star Wars Rogue Squadron Trilogy which was 50% completed and it was going to be released on the Xbox in 2004.
Factor 5 was going to develop a Rogue Squadron game titled Rogue Squadron: X-Wing vs Tie Fighter for the Xbox 360 but it was canceled by LucasArts.
After Factor 5's exclusivity with Sony ended they decided to release Rogue Squadron Trilogy for the Wii, but it was eventually cancelled as well.
In 2004, LucasArts released Star Wars: Battlefront, based on the same formula as the popular Battlefield series of games. It ended up becoming the best-selling Star Wars game of all time to that point, aided by a marketing tie-in with the original trilogy D.V.D. release. Its sequel, Star Wars: Battlefront II, was released on November 1, 2005, and featured new locales such as Episode III planets Mustafar, Mygeeto, etc., in addition to space combat, playable Jedi, and new special units like Bothan spies and Imperial officers. In this same year, the second "Knights of the Old Republic" game was in production. LucasArts told Obsidian Entertainment that the project needed to be finished by that year's holiday season. Obsidian was forced to cut huge amounts of content from the game, resulting in a rushed, unfinished Knights of the Old Republic II.
From Wikipedia’s article on Lucasfilm Games, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4