Respawn Entertainment

Respawn Entertainment, LLC is an American video game development studio founded by Jason West and Vince Zampella. West and Zampella previously co-founded Infinity Ward and created the Call of Duty franchise, where they were responsible for its development until 2010. The studio created the Titanfall series, as well as the free-to-play battle royale game Apex Legends. Respawn was acquired by Electronic Arts on December 1, 2017, and is developing Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order as of June 2019.

History
On March 1, 2010, Activision amended its report with the Securities and Exchange Commission to add notification that two senior employees of Infinity Ward were being fired due to "breaches of contract and insubordination". This coincided with Jason West (Infinity Ward president, game director, co-CCO, and CTO) and Vince Zampella (CEO and co-founder of Infinity Ward) editing their profiles on the website LinkedIn to list Infinity Ward as a former employer as of March 2010. Reportedly, a meeting between Zampella, West, and Activision staff occurred on March 1, after which neither Zampella nor West were seen; this was followed by the arrival of security guards at the studio. It was later confirmed by Activision that West and Zampella had been dismissed, and had been replaced on an interim basis by Activision CTO Steve Pearce and head of production Steve Ackrich.

On April 12, 2010, the Los Angeles Times reported that West and Zampella were forming a new independent gaming studio known as Respawn Entertainment. They were seeking funding from Electronic Arts through the EA Partners Program. West and Zampella will retain the rights to all intellectual property produced by them in the future. As of July 10, 2010, 38 of the 46 Infinity Ward employees who resigned from that studio following the firings of West and Zampella revealed through their LinkedIn and Facebook profiles that they had signed on with Respawn Entertainment.

EA Games Label president Frank Gibeau revealed at E3 2011 in June 2011 that Respawn Entertainment's EA-published shooter was "sci-fi oriented" and would allow the publisher to "compete with things like Gears and Halo". Gibeau also stated that EA would release Respawn's project when it sees an "opportunistic" window. Later that month, Respawn released a blurry teaser image of its unannounced game via the official website launched that day. Respawn further released another blurry image, and teased the new game with mo-cap shot. In April 2013, Respawn registered a trademark for the name Titan, and it was reported that Respawn's game was an always-online Xbox exclusive, although nothing had been confirmed.

In June 2013, Respawn Entertainment debuted Titanfall at E3. On October 22 they revealed the release date of the game to be March 11, 2014 in North America, and March 13 in Europe. In March 2015, it was announced that Respawn was developing a sequel, Titanfall 2, which was later released on October 28, 2016.

In June 2014, it was announced that Stig Asmussen, who previously worked for Sony Santa Monica on the God of War series, had joined the studio as game director of a second project that had nothing to do with Titanfall. From job listings in January 2016, it was found that the project was to be a third person action-adventure game. On May 4, 2016 – Star Wars Day – Asmussen announced Respawn Entertainment was making a third-person Star Wars game, later revealed to be Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order at E3 2018.

In October 2017, it was announced that Respawn Entertainment is developing a virtual reality first person shooter title for the Oculus Rift for a 2019 release.

In November 2017, Electronic Arts acquired the company for US$151 million in cash and up to US$164 million in equity. The acquisition was completed on December 1, 2017.

On February 4, 2019, a battle royale game set in the Titanfall universe, titled Apex Legends, was released.