Early history and company name Brett Sperry and
Louis Castle met in late 1983 in Las Vegas. Sperry had a background in architecture and psychology and was already working in the gaming industry. Both Sperry and Castle worked as contract programmers. The two eventually became friends and decided to form a company together and named it Brelous Software. It was later renamed Westwood Associates. According to Louis Castle, the company was named after the "entertainment meets professional" character of the
Westwood neighborhood in Los Angeles. The company's first projects consisted of contract work for companies like
Epyx They laid the foundations for the
real-time strategy genre with the release of
real-time tactics game ''
BattleTech: The Crescent Hawk's Revenge, one of the more literal translations of the tabletop game BattleTech''.
Later success and acquisition by Virgin Games One of the company's first great successes was
Eye of the Beholder (1991), a real-time
role-playing video game based on the
Dungeons & Dragons license, developed for SSI. Other publishers of early Westwood games included
Infocom and
Disney. Their company was eventually acquired by
Virgin Games in 1992. The company in the late 1980s was known for shipping products late, but by 1993 it had so improved that,
Computer Gaming World reported, "many publishers would assure [us] that a project was going to be completed on time
because Westwood was doing it". The magazine added that it "not only has a solid reputation for getting product out on time, but a reputation for
good product", citing
Eye of the Beholder,
The Legend of Kyrandia, and
Dune II as examples. By then Westwood had about 50 employees, including up to 20 artists. Other Westwood titles from the early 1990s include
Lands of Lore,
The Lion King and
Young Merlin. Westwood's greatest commercial success would start in 1995 with the real-time strategy game
Command & Conquer. Building on the gameplay and interface ideas of
Dune II, it added pre-rendered 3D graphics for gameplay sprites and video cinematics, an alternative pop/rock soundtrack with techno elements streamed from disk, and
online play.
Command & Conquer,
Kyrandia, and
Lands of Lore spawned several sequels.
Acquisition by EA and liquidation In August 1998, Westwood and sister company
Burst Studios was
acquired by Electronic Arts for $122.5 million from
Virgin Interactive's North American operations, which EA also acquired. At the time, Westwood games had a 5% to 6% share of the PC game market, especially the
Command & Conquer franchise was considered very valuable. The 50,000 square foot building in Las Vegas included motion capture facilities, comfortable offices and was considered a showcase for the industry. According to Westwood Studios designer and programmer
Joe Bostic, Electronic Arts did not interfere with Westwood's operations primarily due to Westwood co-founder Brett Sperry's efforts in keeping the corporate cultures of the two companies separate, but eventually Westwood succumbed to wishes that every game had to be a hit. The last games
Command & Conquer: Renegade and
Earth & Beyond did not meet expectations of the publisher. In January 2003, EA announced its intent to close Westwood, as well as
EA Pacific, and merge them into
EA Los Angeles as part of a consolidation plan. This move included "significant layoffs" for Westwood, which at the time employed 100 people, while the remaining people were given the option to transfer to the Los Angeles studio or EA's headquarters. ==Games==