Volition (company)

Deep Silver Volition, LLC (formerly Volition, Inc.), doing business as Volition, is an American video game developer based in Champaign, Illinois. The company was created when two companies split from Parallax Software: Volition and Outrage Entertainment, led by Mike Kulas and Matt Toschlog, in November 1996.

History
When Interplay Entertainment was the publisher, Volition developed the FreeSpace series of space simulation video games. When Interplay tumbled towards bankruptcy, Volition was acquired by THQ in September 2000. Volition has developed several acclaimed titles including the Red Faction series, the Summoner series, The Punisher, and the Saints Row series.

Insane, a game developed in collaboration with Guillermo del Toro was announced at 2010 Spike Video Game Awards but Volition's version of the game was cancelled in 2012.

When THQ filed for bankruptcy, a number of companies showed interest in the assets of THQ. General manager of Volition, Dan Cermak said that Warner Bros., Electronic Arts, Take-Two, Ubisoft, Deep Silver, and an unnamed group undertook site visits in the weeks preceding the sale. Volition was acquired by Koch Media for 22.3 million USD. The only other bid was 5.4 million USD by Ubisoft.

Volition was the second most expensive THQ asset sold during the auction (after Relic Entertainment). The price was understood to be largely due to the success of games such as Saints Row: The Third, which by early 2012 had sold around 4 million copies. THQ also claimed that the game's downloadable content packages were performing much better than anticipated.

Due to THQ's bankruptcy in January 2013, Volition and the Saints Row franchise were acquired by Koch Media, with future titles being published under its Deep Silver brand. Volition's Red Faction and Summoner franchises were not acquired with the company by Deep Silver, instead being acquired by video game publisher and developer Nordic Games.

On September 27, 2017, following the release of Agents of Mayhem, Kotaku reported that Deep Silver had laid off over 30 employees including managing director Dan Cermak, who was replaced by Jim Boone as development director on October 9, 2017.