The bitter rivalry between Activision and EA–which has seen developers move from one publishing giant to the other and has had Activision try to block the release Brutal Legend, a game that they rejected–has just kicked up a notch.
According to various sites, Jason West and Vince Zampella, formerly of Infinity Ward, announced the formation of Respawn Entertainment and that their first game would be published by EA. The execs were only recently ousted from Infinity Ward, the developer of the best-selling Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. West and Zampella just had a counter-suit leveled at them on Friday, where Activision accused them of trying to steal the studio. Activision recently re-organized into a group of business units, with former EA producer Glenn Schofield heading up a studio that will be working on an upcoming COD game.
This ground war’s only going to heat up. Stay tuned to see if any more staff changes or info about Respawn’s first game comes to light.