Video Game News: Interplay Entertainment files 10-k

I caught sight of this oddity over at No Mutants Allowed while wondering why Interplay's forums have been down for a week.

This means the company that brought us the Fallout and Baldur's Gate series is going bye-bye. They recently terminated their once-great Black Isle Studios, and castrated the Fallout 3 RPG project in favor of a console game based on Fallout. Check it out...

IPLY 10-k filing

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As of April 1, 2004, we were three months in arrears on the rent obligations for our corporate lease in Irvine, California. On April 9, 2004, our lessor served us with a Three-Day Notice to Pay Rent or Surrender Possession. If we are unable to pay our rent, we may lose our office space, which would interrupt our operations and cause substantial harm to our business. We have received notice from the Internal Revenue Service ("IRS") that we owe approximately $70,000 in payroll tax penalties. We estimate that we owe an additional $10,000, which we have accrued in penalties for nonpayment of approximately $99,000 in Federal and State payroll taxes, which were due on March 31, 2004 and is still outstanding. We were unable to meet our April 15, 2004 payroll obligations to our employees. Our property, general liability, auto, workers compensation, fiduciary liability, and employment practices liability have been cancelled.

We are currently in default of the settlement agreement with Warner and have entered into a payment plan, of which we are in default, for the balance of the $0.32 million owed payable in one remaining installment. On or about February 23, 2004, we received correspondence from Atari Interactive alleging that Interplay had failed to pay royalties due under the D&D license as of February 15, 2004. If we are unable to cure this alleged breach of the license agreement, we may lose our remaining rights under the license, including the rights to continued distribution of BALDUR'S GATE: DARK ALLIANCE II. The loss of the remaining rights to distribute games created under the D&D license could have a significant negative impact on our future operating results.

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WE CURRENTLY HAVE A NUMBER OF OBLIGATIONS THAT WE ARE UNABLE TO MEET WITHOUT GENERATING ADDITIONAL REVENUES OR RAISING ADDITIONAL CAPITAL. IF WE CANNOT GENERATE ADDITIONAL REVENUES OR RAISE ADDITIONAL CAPITAL IN THE NEAR FUTURE, WE MAY BECOME INSOLVENT AND/OR OUR STOCK WOULD BECOME ILLIQUID OR WORTHLESS.

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WE HAVE A HISTORY OF LOSSES, AND MAY HAVE TO FURTHER REDUCE OUR COSTS BY CURTAILING FUTURE OPERATIONS TO CONTINUE AS A BUSINESS.

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WE HAVE A LIMITED NUMBER OF KEY MANAGEMENT AND OTHER PERSONNEL. THE LOSS OF ANY SINGLE MEMBER OF MANAGEMENT OR KEY PERSON OR THE FAILURE TO HIRE AND INTEGRATE CAPABLE NEW KEY PERSONNEL COULD HARM OUR BUSINESS.

http://biz.yahoo.com/e/040427/iplye.ob10-k.html

How the mighty have fallen. Maybe they were so far gone that not even great success from an excellent Fallout 3 release could have saved them. Sad to see them go the way of the dinosaur. A lot of the Fallout fan base thought IPLY was selling out with the console game, when in fact they were gasping for a last breath before going down permanently.

"out of this world"
now that was a fantastic game.

Interplay has an impressive resume'; if they're failing, no one is safe.

that's like 85. wow.

Out of this World was awesome as well. One of the best nintendo games ever made.

Interplay is synonymous with CRPG. They've been around since the very inception of the idea of putting a role-playing game on a computer. This is the end of an era.