Wright, the man behind the best-selling video games of all time, including “Sim City”, “The Sims” as well as the more recent "Spore", is leaving EA after 12 years to focus his attention on Stupid Fun Club, a think tank designed to develop new forms of entertainment, including video games, movies, television, the Internet and even toys.
"The entertainment industry is moving rapidly into an era of revolutionary change," Wright said in a statement. "Stupid Fun Club will explore new possibilities that are emerging from this sublime chaos and create new forms of entertainment on a variety of platforms."
He added: “In my twelve years at EA, I’ve had the pleasure to work alongside some of the brightest and most talented game developers in the industry and I look forward to working with them again in the near future.”
EA is investing in the venture, which Wright founded in 2001. Both parties will own an equal share, and will be the principal shareholders of Stupid Fun Club.
"We believe in Will’s vision for Stupid Fun Club and we’re looking forward to partnering with Will and his team long into the future,” said EA CEO John Riccitiello in a statement. “Will is a great designer and he’s been part of a great legacy of globally recognized game franchises like The Sims, SimCity and Spore.
“The teams that have been leading those franchises in recent years have a lot of exciting content coming.”
Wright had earlier co-founded the game development company Maxis with Jeff Braun in 1989 and sold it to Electronic Arts in 2007.
Wright designed the first computer game ‘Raid on Bungeling Bay’ in 1984, but it was SimCity that shot him to fame. Released in 1989, the city-building simulation game SimCity was Maxis’ first product, which since has spawned several sequels including SimCity 2000 in 1993, SimCity 3000 in 1999, SimCity 4 in 2003, SimCity DS and SimCity Societies in 2007.
Other titles that were built upon the game's theme of computer simulation include SimEarth, SimCopter, SimLife and SimAnt. Until the release of The Sims in 2000, the SimCity series was the best-selling series of computer games made by Maxis, now part of EA.
“Spore” is Wright’s latest creation. The multi-genre massive single-player online metaverse video game was released in September 2008, and had sold over 10,00,000 copies within three weeks of its release.
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