Neversoft is officially nevermore, as the remaining members of the Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater developer have now fully merged with developer Infinity Ward in order to assist on current and future projects.
To give the developer the proper anarchic closure it needed, the team at Neversoft fired flaming arrows into the its iconic skewered eye logo. Neversoft co-founder Joel Jewett also gave each employee a branded knife as a farewell gift, which is, if nothing else, fitting due to the history of the company and Jewett’s personality.
News of the merger between the two developers was originally announced back in May by Activision CEO Eric Hirshberg. At the time, Hirshberg said that the merger would lead to a “super-studio” within the popular publisher.
“As you know, Neversoft and Infinity Ward teamed up for the development of Call of Duty: Ghosts. Through that process, it became clear that the two studios have very complementary skill sets. Between these two excellent studios, it seemed like a single ‘super-studio’ could emerge.”
Although I was not a fan of the final batch of titles the developer put out (specifically the final entries in the Guitar Hero franchise), I will always have positive memories when it comes to the 20-year run of Neversoft. The Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater franchise is not only the best extreme sports series ever, but among the best sports franchises period. Furthermore, Spider-Man for the PlayStation is an excellent super hero adaptation and Gun is a criminally underrated Xbox 360 launch title.
The strengthened team at Infinity Ward is currently set to release a new Call of Duty title in 2016, following the Sledgehammer Games developed Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare in November and a Treyarch developed title in the franchise set for release in 2015.
