| Type | Unknown |
|---|---|
| Industry | Computer and video games |
| Founded | Paris, France (1992) |
| Headquarters | Paris, France |
| Products | Dune Lost Eden Atlantis: The Lost Tales Ring Frank Herbert's Dune |
| Subsidiaries | Cryo Studios North America Dreamcatcher Interactive |
Cryo Interactive Entertainment is a French video game development and publishing company founded in 1992, but existing unofficially since 1989 as a developer group under the name Cryo. In 2008 Microïds acquired Cryo.
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Cryo was formed by members of ERE Informatique who left Infogrames (proprietor of ERE since 1986) — among these were Philippe Ulrich, Rémi Herbulot and Jean-Martial Lefranc.
The first game developed under the Cryo Interactive moniker was the hit Dune, which granted the newly-formed software company both publicity and funding for further games under Virgin until 1996, when Cryo started self-publishing inside the European market, and in North America through then partially-owned Canadian publisher DreamCatcher Interactive.
Cryo made its name mostly through adaptations of already existing stories (such as Riverworld, based on Philip José Farmer's novel and Ubik by Philip K. Dick) or those based on historical scenarios (like KGB, a game set days before the dissolution of the Soviet Union and several games based in Ancient Egypt, Qing Dynasty's China and Louis XIV's France, developed with Cryo's Omni3D engine). Although most of the post-Virgin games managed to capture and stay true to the original settings, poor interfaces and the lack of worldwide distribution turned little profit from each game.
A Cryo Interactive subsidiary called Cryo Networks, aimed at developing and publishing online applications exclusively, was established in December 1997. Aside from online multiplayer games (Deo Gratias, FireTeam, Mankind and Scotland Yard being some of the titles released under this label), Cryo Networks also maintained a proprietary online multimedia development framework named SCOL (Standard Cryo On Line).
Cryo Networks was dismantled in 2002, shortly earlier than its parent company, leaving its then-ongoing project DUNE Generations unfinished. The SCOL technology was subsequently released as an open source project.
In July 2002, not long after Frank Herbert's Dune flopped, Cryo's situation was no longer sustainable, and the company was declared bankrupt. After much negotiation, most of the assets and development teams of Cryo Interactive were absorbed by DreamCatcher Interactive, forming the base for DreamCatcher Europe.[1]
On 20 October 2008 Microïds acquired the brands and intellectual property of Cryo Interactive.[2] Microïds have also said that they intend to distribute Cryo's older games digitally, and that they are developing new games based on Cryo's IPs.[3]