Escape Factory

Escape Factory, Ltd. was a game development company founded in August, 2000 and subsequently shut down in June, 2003.

At first, Escape Factory focused exclusively on console game development. Their first project was a character-based platform game for the Xbox and PS2 based on the original Space Quest franchise from Sierra.1 Unfortunately, the project was cancelled part-way through development and the founders of Escape Factory decided to leave the extremely competitive console market to focus instead on the new CASUAL game market that was emerging on the Internet.2

Escape Factory's first four casual games were published in the summer of 2003 by WildTangent to positive feedback: "Bounce Symphony"3, "Mars Rover", "STX", and "Overball"4. Based on the success of these games, the founders decided to shut down Escape Factory completely and launched a new venture - Sprout Games - to take advantage of the burgeoning casual game market. The Escape Factory brand is, as of 2010, inactive.

The demise of Escape Factory was documented in a 2004 Game Developers Conference talk titled '''What to Do When it All Goes to Hell -- Lessons Learned Shutting Down a Game Studio".5

Sprout Games was acquired by Popcap Games in 2005.6