Ubisoft Red Storm - History

History

Tom Clancy and Doug Littlejohns, a British Navy Captain founded Red Storm Entertainment in 1996. Originally part of Virtus, the company released its first game – Tom Clancy's Politika, the first in the Power Plays series – in 1997. Based in the Research Triangle area of North Carolina, Red Storm quickly gained a reputation with games like Dominant Species, one of the first 3D realtime strategy games. However, it was with Rainbow Six (1998) that the company firmly established itself commercially. In contrast to the run-and-gun first person shooters(FPS) that had gone before, Rainbow Six was the first true tactical FPS, a game that rewarded patience and planning as well as good aim and a keen eye. Developed alongside the novel of the same name, Rainbow Six introduced terms like "one shot, one kill" and "tango down" into the gamer lexicon. Its ground-breaking multiplayer action, including a new form of cooperative gameplay, set the standard for tactical multiplayer.

Red Storm followed on the success of Rainbow Six with a mission pack, Eagle Watch, and then in 2000 with a sequel, Rainbow Six: Rogue Spear. The company also expanded into turn-based strategy (ruthless.com and Shadow Watch) and military RTS (Force 21). In August 2000 Ubisoft purchased the studio. At the time of the sale, Red Storm was already producing Ghost Recon.

Released in 2001, Ghost Recon won multiple "Game of the Year" awards. The Xbox version also marked the first time RSE ventured into in-house console development, and was the first Xbox Live! title to truly take advantage of the possibilities of console multiplayer. Follow-up add-ons like Island Thunder continued to expand the world of the Ghosts, while Red Storm itself grew and moved offices to a new location in Morrisville, NC. By 2003, Ubisoft was ready to consolidate its North Carolina operations. Ubisoft's other area studio, Sinister Games in downtown Raleigh, was integrated into Red Storm, with the central base of operations remaining at the Morrisville location.

In 2004, Red Storm released Ghost Recon 2, the follow-up to the original game, designed by now Lead Designer Christian Allen. Delivered on Xbox, it signaled the company's transition to primarily console development. It produced an add-on, Summit Strike, in 2005, which moved the action to Kazakhstan, as well as downloadable content, something which would become a hallmark of the franchise. More recently, Red Storm has developed the multiplayer aspects of both iterations of the Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter series. It won the BAFTA's Game of the Year and Best Technical Achievement awards in 2006.