My.com takes over Armored Warfare development from Obsidian

Obsidian Entertainment has handed over development duties of online multiplayer tank battler Armored Warfare to its publisher My.com.

In an official statement, both companies were "grateful" for the the opportunity to work on the project together, with My.com promising that support and development on the game will continue. However, one source suggests the split may have been less civil than it initially appears, PC Gamer reports.

Reddit user Gatortribe, who claims to have been a design consultant on the game, says that creative differences and unaligned priorities are to blame for the collapse of the partnership. His post suggests that Obsidian was initially tasked with creating a World of Tanks clone that was as close to its inspiration "without getting their asses sued off by Wargaming".

Gatortibe claims that while Obsidian was given a little freedom to make Armored Warfare a little more original and less of a copycat title, My.com MailRU parent was determined to get "a cut of the massive amounts of money Wargaming was raking in with World of Tanks". The consultant adds that MailRU pretty much ignored the needs and tastes of the North American and European market, and was not concerned with the game's quality.

"[My team of consultants] began feeling ignored as much of our feedback wasn't bearing fruit in game, and that was when Obsidian finally cracked," Gatortribe writes. "They let us know that MailRU didn't want it, they were happy with the shit state the game was in. In fact, MailRU wasn't even aware of our existence (and they weren't very happy about it afterwards- we aren't Russian, after all)."

Gatortribe concludes that Obsidian's contract was actually cancelled by MailRU, although the studio was willing to continue working on the game. However, an undisclosed number of staff working on the project at Obsidian were laid off in December.

Obsidian is now focusing on its own products, such as the Tyranny series and Pillars of Eternity 2.