| Type | Category: Video game companies |
|---|---|
| Industry | Interactive entertainment |
| Founded | 1996 |
| Headquarters | Gent, Belgium |
| Key people | Swen Vincke (founder) |
| Products |
LEDWars, Ket-Net Kick, Ket-Net Kick2, Divine Divinity, Beyond Divinity, Divinity II: Ego Draconis, Divinity II: Flames of Vengeance |
| Website | http://www.larian.com/ |
Larian Studios is a Belgian game developer which was founded in 1996[1] by Swen Vincke who derived its name from his dog, Pilar.[2] It currently focuses on developing role-playing video game and educational games, apart from LEDWars[3] which is a hardcore strategy game and a number of casino games.[4]
Larian's first project was called The Lady, the Mage and the Knight (LMK). However, they were unable to gain the recognition of any publishers as none believed they were capable of creating a game.[5] In order to rectify this and to prove them wrong, LEDWars (a strategy game) was developed within 5 months and published by Ionos in 1997.[6] As a result, LMK soon evolved into a collaborative project between Larian Studios and Attic Entertainment Software. Due to various problems between the two development studios and its publisher, the project was abandoned in 1999.[7]
In 2002, Larian completed work on Divinity: Sword of Lies which was then published under the name Divine Divinity by CDV.[8] In 2004, Beyond Divinity, expansion to Divine Divinity was published under 2 editions: the standard version by Ubisoft Entertainment GmbH[9] and the deluxe version by MediaMix Benelux which contained Divine Divinity, Beyond Divinity and a novella by Rhianna Pratchett called "Son of Chaos".[10]
In the same year (2004), KetnetKick (an educational and the first PC2TV game ever created) was developed for Ketnet and released by Transposia.[11] In 2006, Beyond Divinity was re-released under Gold Games 9 by Ubisoft Entertainment SA which was a set of 10 games on 6 DVDs.[12]
In March 2008, Adventure Rock,[13] an online virtual world was completed and released. This was later followed by the release of KetnetKick 2 in Oct 2008 by VRT, the national broadcaster in Belgium. In March 2009, GulliLand[14] was published by Jeunesse TV, a French national broadcasting channel. In January 2010, Larian released Divinity 2 : Ego Draconis - the sequel to Divine Divinity - to the US market on Xbox 360 and Windows[15] simultaneously, after releases in Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Poland, Russia and Benelux. Larian is currently in production of Divinity 2 : Flames Of Vengeance, the highly anticipated expansion pack, and is expected to build a Gold Deluxe version that holds all Divinity 2 episodes later in the year.
Right now Larian is working on Dragon Commander which will be released in 2012.[16]
Divinity series: