Like some of the games Irvine-based Interplay Entertainment Inc. used to produce, the company is shrouded in mystery these days.
A quarter after the video game developer said it wouldn’t be able to pay creditors, workers or its landlord, Interplay’s Web site has been taken down. No one answers the company’s phone. And Interplay’s stock, at about a penny, is fitting for a company on the edge of bankruptcy.
About nine months ago, Interplay moved into a tiny executive office suite in Irvine under the landing path of John Wayne Airport. A secretary at the building said no one from Interplay had been in the office for about two months, “but they do pay their rent,” she said.
Interplay executives couldn’t be reached for comment.
The nail in the coffin for what once was one of Orange County’s most prominent game developers might rest across the Atlantic.
A French court recently declared Titus Interactive SA, the Paris-based game publisher that bought a controlling stake in Interplay in 2001, bankrupt.
Industry publication GameSpot quoted the judge overseeing the case as saying, “Titus was unable to finance any new games. There was no hope of financial rectification.”
The bankruptcy doesn’t cover subsidiaries such as Interplay, though the game developer appears to be suffering along with Titus.
Interplay posted a $275 million loss in September, the last time it reported financial results. According to a Securities and Exchange Commission filing, Interplay had cash of $71,000 and accounts payable of $10.3 million.
In the filing, the company said it “anticipates its current cash reserves, plus its expected generation of cash from existing operations, will not be sufficient to fund its anticipated expenditures.”
That’s not to say Interplay has nothing of value. The company still has licenses,and royalties,for several games, including “Balder’s Gate,” a series of fantasy role-playing titles.
“Unfortunately it had to end this way,” said founder Brian Fargo, who Titus ousted in 2002, not long after he tried to sell the company. “I had three buyers who were willing to pay in the hundreds of millions of dollars.”
For more on this story, see the March 14 print edition of the Orange County Business Journal.
