Digital Anvil

Digital Anvil is a computer game company. It was founded in 1996, when Wing Commander (computer game) creator Chris Roberts left Origin Systems, Inc., along with many other employees.

According to Chris Roberts, Digital Anvil was created to bring back the small-team element that characterized the computer gaming industry throughout the 1980s. Four titles were initially announced: , an ambitious unofficial followup to Wing Commander: Privateer .

The first game to be released by Digital Anvil was Starlancer , developed externally by Warthog (company). It was, unfortunately, released during an era of declining interest in space-combat, and the game was a financial failure. Two planned sequels were scrapped.

Digital Anvil was purchased by exclusive. Of all the projects being produced, only Freelancer escaped major change. Co-founder Chris Roberts left the company after the Microsoft takeover, but he still worked as a consultant on Freelancer .

For the next year, Digital Anvil was mostly silent, and many wondered whether any games from the company would see the light of day. Then, in 2001, Digital Anvil revealed a leaner, meaner Freelancer to the gaming press. Although some of the more ambitious elements were dropped, this act proved Freelancer was not vaporware.

In March 2003, Freelancer was released and immediately became one of the month s top-selling games. Reviews were mixed, but the game did well commercially. In May of the same year, Digital Anvil released Brute Force for the Xbox. The game also did quite well, setting first-month sales records for Xbox games.

=Related Topics=

*Chris Roberts *Freelancer (computer game) *Microsoft *Origin Systems, Inc. *Wing Commander (computer game)