History
christohper Weaver started Media Technologies in 1986, along with working on high-end technologies in the labs of MIT, and going on to both NBC and ABC before becoming the chief engineer to the House Subcommittee on Communications. As if he hadn't already done enough with his life yet, he started another company not long after. This is how Bethesda Softworks came to life. He wanted to get into the market for PC gaming. Ironically they started with sports titles, when over the years, they would be known as the creators of the "most sprawling fantasy epics of gaming history from medieval magic to the radioactive future."
In 1990, Bethesda left Bethesda, Maryland,where it originated from, and moved next door to Rockville, Maryland. Bethesda decided that it should create something of its own. Ironically Bethesda's staff were way more interested into dungeons and Dragons than the sports games they were creating. So when they began to change everything they decided to combine their knowledge of competitive sports tittles with their interest in fantasy. Not to long after one of the largest and most widely played franchises started to go under development, Arena, which was originally supposed to be a gladiator combat game, in which the player would slowly build up a team to tour the world's stadiums in battles to the death. But over time, and as the game progressed they decided to add a story and some side quests. The story and the side-quests started to get more in depth and fun to play. Eventually, the tournament part was dropped altogether, and almost by accident, Bethesda had a first-person RPG on its hands.
Bethesda started to show cracks and malfuncion's in their games, with too large of a work load. In 1996 Daggerfall was released and following its release Bethesda went right into creating more games and the third elderscrolls (Arena being the first, and Daggerfall being the second).There were a lot of problems with the games they were creating and no one was really buying them,and Bethesda's money was running dry.
Close to bankruptcy, the development team had shrunk to about six people. Then, out of nowhere, ZeniMAx Media offered to buy the company and bail them out of their financial difficulties. Therefore, ZeniMax, which was co-founded by Christopher Weaver, acquired Media Technologies, also founded by Christopher Weaver, which owned Bethesda Softworks, which was founded by Christopher Weaver.
After all of the struggle to stay afloat Bethesda hit some hardships,and it only would get worse. In late 2001, Weaver was ousted form ZeniMax by his own partners. Weaver later sued them, claiming that his partners had bought his strong brands and then got rid of him. However, the case was not deemed worthy of going to court, since he had illegally searched his former partners emails for information. He still owned one third of the company though.
The company wasnt going to make it, and only one great seller would save them. The entire companies faith was in lead developer,Todd Howard. He was developing the full sequel for elder scrolls, the third installment in the series. He did it, almost as if by some miracle it actually sold, and sold well, it may have just single-handedly saved the company.
Morrowind was what they called the third installment and it was the turn over point of Bethesda's career. Oblivion followed, and ultimately skyrim. After 2002, and the release of Morrowind Bethesda has hit little to no hiccups. Waiting to release games until they are absolutely sure it is ready, there are some complaints about the glitches, but this is only because there is so much information and stuff going on at one time anything of the time that it was released couldn't handle it.
Bethesda has been on a wild roller coaster when it comes to their success, but, for the most part, they are understanding how to evolve as the modern gamers evolve and they're keeping up with what is popular in today's gaming world. For example, many people who played skyrim never touched a first person RPG before that and it only was released three years ago!
(Werner, 2001)
christohper Weaver started Media Technologies in 1986, along with working on high-end technologies in the labs of MIT, and going on to both NBC and ABC before becoming the chief engineer to the House Subcommittee on Communications. As if he hadn't already done enough with his life yet, he started another company not long after. This is how Bethesda Softworks came to life. He wanted to get into the market for PC gaming. Ironically they started with sports titles, when over the years, they would be known as the creators of the "most sprawling fantasy epics of gaming history from medieval magic to the radioactive future."
In 1990, Bethesda left Bethesda, Maryland,where it originated from, and moved next door to Rockville, Maryland. Bethesda decided that it should create something of its own. Ironically Bethesda's staff were way more interested into dungeons and Dragons than the sports games they were creating. So when they began to change everything they decided to combine their knowledge of competitive sports tittles with their interest in fantasy. Not to long after one of the largest and most widely played franchises started to go under development, Arena, which was originally supposed to be a gladiator combat game, in which the player would slowly build up a team to tour the world's stadiums in battles to the death. But over time, and as the game progressed they decided to add a story and some side quests. The story and the side-quests started to get more in depth and fun to play. Eventually, the tournament part was dropped altogether, and almost by accident, Bethesda had a first-person RPG on its hands.
Bethesda started to show cracks and malfuncion's in their games, with too large of a work load. In 1996 Daggerfall was released and following its release Bethesda went right into creating more games and the third elderscrolls (Arena being the first, and Daggerfall being the second).There were a lot of problems with the games they were creating and no one was really buying them,and Bethesda's money was running dry.
Close to bankruptcy, the development team had shrunk to about six people. Then, out of nowhere, ZeniMAx Media offered to buy the company and bail them out of their financial difficulties. Therefore, ZeniMax, which was co-founded by Christopher Weaver, acquired Media Technologies, also founded by Christopher Weaver, which owned Bethesda Softworks, which was founded by Christopher Weaver.
After all of the struggle to stay afloat Bethesda hit some hardships,and it only would get worse. In late 2001, Weaver was ousted form ZeniMax by his own partners. Weaver later sued them, claiming that his partners had bought his strong brands and then got rid of him. However, the case was not deemed worthy of going to court, since he had illegally searched his former partners emails for information. He still owned one third of the company though.
The company wasnt going to make it, and only one great seller would save them. The entire companies faith was in lead developer,Todd Howard. He was developing the full sequel for elder scrolls, the third installment in the series. He did it, almost as if by some miracle it actually sold, and sold well, it may have just single-handedly saved the company.
Morrowind was what they called the third installment and it was the turn over point of Bethesda's career. Oblivion followed, and ultimately skyrim. After 2002, and the release of Morrowind Bethesda has hit little to no hiccups. Waiting to release games until they are absolutely sure it is ready, there are some complaints about the glitches, but this is only because there is so much information and stuff going on at one time anything of the time that it was released couldn't handle it.
Bethesda has been on a wild roller coaster when it comes to their success, but, for the most part, they are understanding how to evolve as the modern gamers evolve and they're keeping up with what is popular in today's gaming world. For example, many people who played skyrim never touched a first person RPG before that and it only was released three years ago!
(Werner, 2001)