What, No Kiss Goodbye?

Well… I guess that’s it for Interplay.

Less than a day after CEO Herve Caen said Interplay was “still here,” the publisher has apparently been shut down by the State of California. The Orange County Register’s Tamara Chuang reported late Friday that California’s Department of Industrial Relations, Division of Labor Standards Enforcement forced the Irvine, California-based developer-publisher of Fallout to suspend operations.

The closure followed a snap inspection of Interplay’s offices by investigators, who found the company was without workers’ compensation insurance and had not paid employees. According to officials, there were 14 staffers on-site Friday during the inspection, and 79 still on Interplay’s payroll–down nearly 40 since their mid-April financial statements.

I guess their last shot is this Fallout MMORPG, which I probably won’t care about, since I don’t play MMORPGS. Penny Arcade’s got a pretty funny commentary on the whole thing. I feel bad for all those poor bastards who haven’t been paid, but still cling to the hope that their hard work and sacrifice can pull the company out of the red. I hope it pays off, for their sake.

It’s sad for me, because I’ve been over to the Irvine Interplay offices many times, and I’ve always enjoyed the fact that it was right there. When I was with the old game company, we met with Interplay folk trying to get funding or advice many times. Not to mention all the free games over the years. Now I’ve gotta go cozy back up to the Blizzard crowd again. *sigh*