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In the past few years Diego County became a large center for video game development, making it impossible at this time to estimate how the San Diego fires will effect the video games industry as celebrity homes and entire communities are being destroyed.
With such companies as ROCKSTAR SAN DIEGO, Sony Computer Entertainment and Midway to name just a few that are known to be in the area the fires will have an impact on the industry. A subsidiary of the Tokyo game maker called Sammy Corp, is headquartered there and the newly formed High Moon Studios employs more than 130 people at a facility in San Diego, California. It is estimated that several hundred video game programmers work in San Diego County…
Sony does PlayStation game development in Sorrento Valley, as does Electronic Arts in Carlsbad. The area has been an intellectual think tank for the development of geek hardware and computer chips as well as games. The video games industry has driven the market for faster and better PC’s for many years. The UCSD has provided interns to video games studios and publishers who developed game titles. Money has been donated to the school’s Experimental Game Lab in the past by Sammy. UCSD has been said to provide a long-term vision for the technology industries.
There are many fire blogs out there right now. An apparent SOE employee “Grimwell” writes:
Last night someone had already died and over a dozen were in the hospital. No clue as of yet for today. Houses have burned, etc. The moon is reflecting the light at us, it’s pretty cool to see but a major bad thing considering the reason.
What’s this mean for SOE? We are on a very light staff in the office, and the rest of us are working from home. I don’t know how many coworkers live in evacuated areas, but I’m sure some do. I’m pretty safe, I see more than anything, but the soot is coming down in the neighborhood, and we are getting things in preparation to go.
Be nice to us if something sucks in the game today ok?
(Above) …my cell phone photo that I took this morning.
Over at the EverQuest Vault EverQuest Vault someone posted this from a Print News Source.
California Fires Continue to Affect SOE
As the fires rage in San Diego County, the SOE Staff has been asked to stay home. According to Absor, who posted to the EQLive forums yesterday, apparently there is no way to check on the safety of all the staff members, as residents have been asked to stay off cell phones to leave the lines clear for emergency communications.
Absor wrote to the community:
“I don’t normally ask you all to forgive our problems, but right now it appears that I have to.
We were asked not to go to the office today. The fires going on in the San Diego area are very extensive. In fact, I’m not at all sure I could reach the office from here right now. The 15 freeway is closed. It’s hard to tell exactly where these fires are burning, but there are at least of them going in the area right now, one has burned more than 20,000 acres and it threatening or has already destroyed many homes.
I highly doubt we will be in the office tomorrow either.”
The news is still grim:
“Thousands more residents were ordered to evacuate their homes Tuesday, bringing the number of people chased away by the wind-whipped flames that have engulfed Southern California to at least 270,000.
At least 250,000 in San Diego alone were told to leave. Public schools were closed, as were campuses at the University of California, San Diego and San Diego State University.
In the northern part of the county, 500 homes and 100 businesses had been destroyed as a wildfire exploded to 145,000 acres and marched toward the Pacific Coast enclave of Del Mar, forcing a partial evacuation.
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