High Moon Studios, Inc. (formerly Sammy Entertainment Inc. and Sammy Studios, Inc.) is an American video game developer initially formed in 2001. After nearly a year as an independent studio, the developer was acquired by Vivendi Games in January 2006 and placed under Sierra Entertainment. It is currently owned by Activision. It has developed multiple Transformers video games and assisted in the development of select Call of Duty games, as well as Destiny.
History High Moon Studios was formed in April 2001 as a division of the Japanese publisher Sammy, first known as Sammy Entertainment and later renamed Sammy Studios the following year, to develop and publish games in America. After Sammy merged with Sega to form Sega Sammy Holdings on October 1, 2004, Sammy discontinued all video game development in America to focus on its Japanese productions, and planned on closing Sammy Studios as part of this. However on March 3, 2005, Sammy Studios was acquired in a management buyout by a group led by president and CEO John Rowe, and renamed High Moon Studios. Turning to game development only, the studio continued development of games from its time as Sammy Studios, including the Western horror shooter Darkwatch. In January 2006, it was announced that Vivendi Universal Games had acquired the studio. After the merger of Vivendi and Activision, High Moon became a subsidiary of Activision.
Following the completion of Deadpool, Activision laid off 40 full-time employees from High Moon Studios that worked on the project. Activision stated "Activision Publishing consistently works to align its costs with its revenues – this is an ongoing process, with the completion of development on Deadpool, we are taking a reduction in staff at High Moon Studios to better align our development talent against our slate."
Games developed
Lead developer + Year Title Platform(s) 2005 DarkwatchPlayStation 2, Xbox 2008 Robert Ludlum's The Bourne ConspiracyPlayStation 3, Xbox 360 2010 Transformers: War for CybertronPlayStation 3, Windows, Xbox 360 2011 Transformers: Dark of the MoonPlayStation 3, Xbox 360 2012 Transformers: Fall of CybertronPlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Windows, Xbox 360, Xbox One 2013 Deadpool
Support developer Year Title Platform(s) 2014 Call of Duty: Advanced WarfarePlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Windows, Xbox 360, Xbox One DestinyPlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360, Xbox One2016Call of Duty: Modern Warfare RemasteredPlayStation 4, Windows, Xbox One2017Destiny 2Call of Duty: WWII2019Call of Duty: Modern Warfare2020Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold WarPlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows, Xbox One, Xbox Series2021Call of Duty: Vanguard2022Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 22023Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III2024Call of Duty: Black Ops 62025Call of Duty: Black Ops 7
References
External links
High Moon Studios profile on MobyGames