Seven Lights was a
privately held
A privately held company (or simply a private company) is a company whose Stock, shares and related rights or obligations are not offered for public subscription or publicly negotiated in their respective listed markets. Instead, the Private equi ...
, American developer/publisher of
multiplayer online games
A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system (couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or ...
headquartered in
Chicago, Illinois
Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...
.
History
Early in 2002, founders Tim Harris, Mike McCarthy and Dave Shuck conceived a game development process for hardcore games done entirely in the browser, using Flash technology. The idea, as Harris told Firing Squad as the company announced itself, was that they had "accumulated a ton of ideas about the way that the Internet can create new and different takes on the games we've all played. We looked at the overhead required to get into the games business in a "traditional" way and thought, 'Wait a minute... we can take a different angle.' That angle is to create extremely lean development teams and launch in the web environment to give ourselves the ability to create a constant stream of new content, iterate the game experience itself and ultimately build game franchises from the ground up with the players helping guide us every step of the way."
The team began working on their first title,
The Continuum
''The Continuum'' is a discontinued online strategy game that combines turn-based war gaming with role-playing game-like character development and the collectability of a tabletop miniatures game. It takes place in the Crossworld, a new reality ...
, an online collectible wargame with characters that develop in an RPG-type fashion. To facilitate the creation of many games in this vein, the company created a real-time content management system so that new characters, abilities, equipment and battle maps could be introduced in a much quicker fashion than the typical development cycle for game expansions. This platform was completed prior to the introduction of The Continuum, and is forming the basis for all future Seven Lights games.
The Continuum, which launched in June 2008 and is introducing its first expansion in August 2008, represents a leap forward for hardcore gaming in the browser and it features an extremely deep level "of customization that users can put into the building and fine-tuning of their armies, but this is all just buildup to the game itself, which consists of a turn based one-on-one war. The battle system uses tiles to determine how far each character can move, and each action (be it attack, cast a spell, or any number of special abilities) is activated through an onscreen menu."
The Continuum was officially shut down in 2011.
[{{cite web , archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110716225752/http://www.thecontinuum.com/ , archive-date=July 16, 2011 , url=http://www.thecontinuum.com/ , title=The Continuum , date=July 16, 2011 , website=SevenLights.com , access-date=February 9, 2023] In 2012, Tim Harris was announced as a cofounder of mobile studio
Industrial Toys. The studio was acquired by
Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by former Apple Inc., Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry ...
in 2018 and shut down in 2023.
See also
*
Multiplayer Online Games
A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system (couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or ...
*
Role Playing Games
A role-playing game (sometimes spelled roleplaying game, or abbreviated as RPG) is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, eith ...
References
External links
The Continuum(offline since 2012)
Seven Lights website(offline since 2017)
Video game companies established in 2002
Multiplayer online games
Video game companies of the United States
Video game development companies
2002 establishments in Illinois