Despite its name, the Black Isle is not an island, but a peninsula, surrounded on three sides by water – the Cromarty Firth to the north, the Beauly Firth to the south, and the Moray Firth to the east. On its fourth, western side, its boundary is delineated by rivers. The River Conon divides Maryburgh, a mile outside Dingwall, from Conon Bridge which is the first village on the Black Isle from the north-western side. Its southwestern boundary is variously considered to be marked by either a minor tributary of the River Beauly separating Beauly (in Inverness-shire) and Muir of Ord (on the Black Isle in Ross and Cromarty), dividing the two counties and also delineating the start of the Black Isle; or alternatively, the River Beauly itself, thus including Beauly in the Black Isle despite its official placement in Inverness-shire.
Black Isle is based in Irvine, California. The division was formed in 1996, adopting the name "Black Isle Studios" in 1998. The idea for the division's name came from the Black Isle in Scotland - founder Feargus Urquhart's ancestral country. Black Isle Studios is most famous for working on the first two games in the popular and influential Fallout series as well as the critically acclaimed Planescape: Torment. They also achieved success with the Icewind Dale and Baldur's Gate series of role-playing video games, though they only published the Baldur's Gate series. In 1999, IGN's RPG Vault gave it the award for a Developer Of The Year.
On August 22, 2012, Black Isle Studios was revived with the motto "Our goal has always been to make the world's best RPGs" and the slogan "Black Isle is Back". As of May 2015 this new incarnation of the studio appears to be defunct.
Torment was a hit for various reasons - but surprisingly, much of Black Isle Studios was entirely unfamiliar with the Dungeons & Dragons campaign setting that started it all.
Speaking to PC Gamer in a recent interview, Black Isle Studios founder Feargus Urquhart has the answer to Planescape ...That's what Black Isle Studios did in the end, and it revolutionized the RPG scene forever.
Black Isle Studios made sure its venerable Dungeons & DragonsRPG Planescape ... seamlessly transporting the immersive fantasy of table-top RPGs to PCs everywhere, Black Isle Studios wanted more.
While at Black Isle Studios, Sawyer worked as the lead systems designer for a later-cancelled Fallout 3 project codenamed Van Buren... studio to develop New Vegas - one Sawyer was not going to pass up.
As Dame Shirley Bassey once famously bellowed, "It's all just a little bit of history repeating" ... You get, for instance, the game that started it all - Black Isle Studios' original 1997 post-apocalyptic RPG, Fallout - plus its 1998 sequel ... Read more .
Picking up the scraps left over from developers Interplay and Black Isle Studios, Bethesda blended the apocalyptic world-building of the first two games with its own real-time, first-person gameplay ...
As is the case with most Bethesda-related releases, though, FalloutLondon is suffering a chaotic launch - with fan complaints, praises, and all ...RPG veteran Josh Sawyer says Black Isle Studios' stab at Fallout 3 was never going to be made in time.
Although Fallout 3 is, of course, a game that exists, two attempts at a third Fallout game were made by Black Isle Studios before that final version by Bethesda ever came to be.
Memory is a funny thing ... While there are plenty of memorable quests and gigs in CD Projekt Red's RPG, the side job Dream On refuses to leave my mind ... RPG veteran Josh Sawyer says Black Isle Studios' stab at Fallout 3 was never going to be made in time.
Back in the good ol’ days, the Fallout series was a beloved isometric CRPG series developed by Black Isle Studios, a renowned developer that shut down in the early aughts ... time at Black Isle Studios.
... to further the studio's ambitions ... Following the shutdown of original developer Black Isle Studios, the popular Baldur's Gate license was sitting untouched with D&D publisher Wizards of the Coast.
