When GameTap discovered in early February that Electronic Arts had a secret division -- codename Blueprint -- designed to produce games leveraging the power of social networking havens like Facebook, we were interested. Weeks later, when Variety uncovered that the division housed the same development team reporting to Steven Spielberg, we were intrigued. Ditto for Kotaku's reveal that Blueprint had set up a deal with Armature, a new firm comprised of former Metroid Prime developers.
What games, we wondered, might this secretive organization be cooking up?
We may never know -- because Variety is reporting that EA has dismantled the entire division.
From the article:
A former employee who worked on Blueprint confirmed to Variety that all the corporate employees who worked on the project have either quit, been laid off, or moved onto other projects.
Though the truth of this cannot really be determined as the division never officially existed in the first place -- like a good secretary, EA will disavow any knowledge of Blueprint's actions -- the source intimated that Blueprint gradually fell apart after the departure of its leader Neil Young to iPhone game publisher Ngmoco, and that those employees who remained were among those let go in EA's recent 600-man scouring.
There's a notable parallel with EA's Casual Entertainment label, which was closed mere weeks ago after the departure of president Kathy Vrabek.
But though this Blueprint has self-destructed, it seems that the division's plans for a distributed development solution for games will not go entirely to waste. Variety's source says that Boom Blox 2 is currently in production, and its development team includes people from all around the world.
Interestingly, Fritz discloses that EA Blueprint's original name was Transmedia; during a routine google search, GameCyte noticed that there currently exists a website called EA|Blueprint at www.theyoungblog.com -- a URL that redirects to www.trnsmdia.com. Coincidence?
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