4mm Games

4mm Games, LLC
LLC
Industry Video games
Fate Dissolved [1]
Founded 2008[2]
Defunct 2012 [1]
Headquarters New York City, New York, USA
Key people
 Jamie King, Gary Foreman, Nicholas Perrett, Paul Coyne [3]
Products

Def Jam Rapstar,[4]
Dog Show Friends,[5]

Alli Skate [6]

4mm Games was a New York–based video game development company founded in 2008[2] by two founders of Rockstar Games, Jamie King and Gary Foreman along with former Image Metrics exec Nicholas Perrett, and Def Jam Enterprises, Warner Music Group and NBC exec Paul Coyne.[3] 4mm was founded with the intent of bringing the experience of Constantly Connected Gaming to the next generation of gamers.[7] OBE and former NCSoft CEO Geoff Heath was a member of the advisory board and offers strategic input.[8]

The company released the Terminal Reality developed and Konami / Autumn Games published Hip-Hop Music game Def Jam Rapstar[4] on October 5, 2010, in North America[9] and November 26, 2010, in Europe[10] for the PlayStation 3, Nintendo Wii, and Xbox 360.

4mm Games also released Dog Show Friends, a Facebook social game based on The National Dog Show Presented by Purina in conjunction with NBC Sports on November 24, 2010.[5]

The company was working with Alli, the Alliance of Action Sports to create new digital titles based on the organization’s events. The plan was to release games based on sports such as snowboarding, skateboarding and motocross, as well as Alli tournaments such as the Dew Tour, Gatorade Free Flow Tour and Winter Dew Tour. According to 4mm, the games would have provided both “bite sized and fully immersive game play experiences” and would be released on a range of platforms, including mobiles, Smartphones, TV and web browser.[11] The first of these games was to have been a free-to-play browser-based skateboarding game called Alli Skate.[6]

Closure

The release of Def Jam Rapstar was lukewarm and a year later the web portal burned through available funds and was closed without warning. 4mm founder Jamie King later stated in an interview that the problem was that they became too ambitious and that he wished they had "either pushed the game back and made it for Kinect or [had it] come out a year earlier."[1] 4mm continued to work on other projects such as an experiment with UK game developer Jagex. However, on March 31, 2012, EMI Music Group filed a suit against 4mm and Terminal Reality. The suit claims that the game uses 54 unlicensed tracks that EMI values at $150,000 each.[12] On May 15, 2012, GameIndustry held an interview with King who stated that 4mm had run out of money and is on-hold. One of the reasons King cited was the ongoing lawsuit with EMI.[1] Two months later, City National Bank sued Konami and Autumn Games for $8.9 million over a $15 million line of credit it approved for the game's development.[13] It is unclear what affect, if any, the CNB lawsuit will have on any potential future of 4mm.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Matt Martin (2012-05-15). "4mm Games: From Startup to Shutdown". GamesIndustry.biz. Retrieved 2012-05-24.
  2. 1 2 "4mm Games". NYC Game Industry. Retrieved 2009-05-28.
  3. 1 2 Matt Martin (2009-08-26) "4mm Games' Nicholas Perrett", GamesIndustry.biz. Retrieved 2011-01-26.
  4. 1 2 Charles Onyett (2009-05-28). "Pre-E3 2009: Def Jam Rapstar Announced". IGN. Archived from the original on 31 May 2009. Retrieved 2009-05-28.
  5. 1 2 David Cohen (2010-11-24) "NBC Sports, 4mm Games, Facebook Become Dog Show Friends", Gamespot. Retrieved 2011-01-26.
  6. 1 2 Garrett Estrada (2010-10-21) "4mm reveals new game at Dew Tour skate finals", The Rebel Yell. Retrieved 2011-01-26.
  7. ↑ Konami UK "Def Jam Rapstar", Konami. Retrieved 2011-01-26.
  8. ↑ Christopher Dring (2010-05-06) "Heath returns with 4mm Games", MCV. Retrieved 2011-01-26.
  9. ↑ Tom Magrino (2010-07-03) "Def Jam Rapstar dropping in NA October 5", Gamespot. Retrieved 2011-01-26.
  10. ↑ (2010-11-26) "MAKE THE WORLD YOUR STAGE WITH DEF JAM RAPSTAR", Gamasutra. Retrieved 2011-01-26.
  11. ↑ James Batchelor (2010-06-11) "4mm to enter Action Sports market", MCV. Retrieved 2011-01-26.
  12. ↑ David Hinkle (2012-03-31). "EMI sues Def Jam Rapstar creators". Joystiq. Retrieved 2012-05-24.
  13. ↑ Alexander Sliwinski (2012-05-24). "Konami and Autumn Games sued for fraud over $15 million Def Jam Rapstar loan". Joystiq. Retrieved 2012-05-24.

External links

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