MapleStory dev's Vancouver studio shuttered

by Randy Nelson { Jan 28th 2009 at 5:22PM }

We're sure you've all heard of Nexon Vancouver (a.k.a. Humanature), the Canadian branch of Korean MapleStory creator, Nexon. Oh, you haven't. That's likely because it hadn't produced any games. And now it's been closed, as confirmed by Gamasutra.

The studio had been working on a free-to-play MMO titled Sugar Rush (not to be confused with the BBC series) and was headed up by Relic Entertainment co-founder, Alex Garden. Upwards of 90 employees have reportedly been let go in the closure, which Nexon has attributed to "today's economic landscape and the need to secure Nexon's core business for the long term."

Nexon's Los Angeles operation will remain open and, according to the company, "will continue to work on our existing titles as well as upcoming titles for 2009." (Unlike the now-defunct Vancouver unit, the folks at Nexon L.A. aren't developing original content -- they perform localization of Nexon's Korean language titles for the US.) For those keeping tabs on the Great Games Industry Bloodletting of Ought-Nine, we're up to three studio closures (Black Box, Pandemic Brisbane, Humanature) and some 335 jobs lost -- not counting the ones EA and Microsoft won't disclose.

Tags: humanature, layoffs, maplestory, nexon, nexon-vancouver

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

ice~ @ Jan 28th 2009 5:26PM

I think you guys should stop posting stuff about lay offs and the condition of todays economy :/ it's too depressing, and maybe if people don't know how bad things really are they'll have confidence in the american economy and everything will be peachy and happy!!!! No? okay then...

melodromaticboys @ Jan 28th 2009 6:55PM

Get the f**k over it. Just because you don't wanna hear the truth doesn't mean it's going to change anything. How about this? We will leave you out of the loop and then you can get f**ked over later in life. Sound good?

CB @ Jan 28th 2009 7:59PM

^Why so serious?

ice~ @ Jan 29th 2009 2:20AM

Oh my god calm down buddy, i wasn't being serious...

willyolio @ Jan 30th 2009 12:52AM

the people must never know. I LAID OFF THOSE PEOPLE. call it in.

ice~ @ Jan 30th 2009 2:13AM

Willyolio how dare you! I bet your that guy that caused that global warming thingy too huh?

Josh @ Jan 28th 2009 5:29PM

Sugar Rush was on Channel 4, not the BBC.

At least make correct references to awesome lesbian TV shows.

WiNG from www.LifeinaGame.com XboxLive&SteamID: WiNGSPANTT @ Jan 28th 2009 5:32PM

A surprisingly large number of people play this game.

ice~ @ Jan 28th 2009 5:59PM

I used to.....It is really REALLY bad....it consumed 2 years of my life then i realized im playing a worthless 2day childish game, i then bought an Xbox 360 and PS3 lol

ice~ @ Jan 28th 2009 5:59PM

2-D i have no idea why i wrote 2-day......that's what maple story does to your mind!!!! lol

Dr Jeckyl and Mr ESC. @ Jan 28th 2009 7:58PM

I too agree it sucks, I saw it announced on Shonen Jump once I gave it a try and I still regret it to this day.

LVLing up sucks and takes forever, the monsters you fight look like crap and anything that looks good are reserved for LVLs 100.

People cheated the crap of that game and only otakus (and other very sad people) played it constantly, I played for a month and quitted.

Also that it was mostly populated by kids and pedophiles.

Linkman2004 @ Jan 28th 2009 7:06PM

Nexon doesn't make MapleStory, they merely publish it. Wizet is the developer.

the_insider @ Jan 28th 2009 8:29PM

You guys should really get your facts straight. Blackbox has NOT been closed down. Yes, there were layoffs, but the studio is still up and running and will continue to do so, even when they move to the big EA Canada campus sometime in teh future.

Also that tally of lay-offs sounds mightily low. I think you are missing a whole a bunch of devs in that total...

Josh @ Jan 28th 2009 8:28PM

So Sugar Rush is dead? Or not? Or what? Jeez, the release situations of these kinds of games are always so confusing...

Anyway, I kind of remember being sort of interested in it, so I'd like to know.

BML @ Jan 29th 2009 12:09AM

Its not really the first time for Nexon - they used to be around back in the mid 90's but then closed down... but the office that closed spun off into Kru Interactive (with the Nexon games out at the time)

MikeO. @ Jan 29th 2009 7:41AM

Nexon has also passed up some of it's former great game.

When KRU interactive (who still has many of the same employees) took over NexusTK, they turned it into a microtransaction game like MapleStory and drove away probably 60% of its players.

Man, Nexus was an addictive game. ;)

BananaBoat @ Jan 29th 2009 11:27AM

NexusTK is not a microtransaction game. It's a monthly subscription game that happens to have various cosmetic (mostly) items you can purchase for your characters through an app store.

I've been playing off and on since it's beta over ten years ago (mostly off for the past 4ish years). It was fun, when it's graphics actually qualified as decent (ten years ago :P)