Animation Magic () was a Russian-American animation studio founded in
Gaithersburg, Maryland
Gaithersburg ( ) is a city in Montgomery County, Maryland, United States. At the time of the 2020 United States census, Gaithersburg had a population of 69,657, making it the third-largest incorporated city and the ninth-most populous communit ...
in 1991, with offices later added in
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is a suburb in the Greater Boston metropolitan area, located directly across the Charles River from Boston. The city's population as of the 2020 United States census, ...
and a 100%-owned subsidiary in
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the List of cities and towns in Russia by population, second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the Neva, River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland ...
,
Russia
Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...
. The company developed animations for CD-based software. It was acquired in December 1994 by
Capitol Multimedia. The assets and rights that Capitol owned would be sold to
Davidson & Associates in April 1997.
By 1994 Animation Magic had 90 employees, including 12 software engineers and approximately 60 animators, computer graphic, background and sprite artists. Its products included ''
Hotel Mario'', ''
Link: The Faces of Evil'', ''
Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon'', ''Mutant Rampage: Bodyslam'', ''Pyramid Adventures'', ''
I.M. Meen'', ''
King's Quest VII: The Princeless Bride'', ''
Darby the Dragon'', and the cancelled ''
Warcraft Adventures: Lord of the Clans''.
Legacy
Circa 2006, games by Animation Magic were major source materials for
YouTube poops, specifically ''
Hotel Mario'', ''
Link: The Faces of Evil'', ''
Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon'', and ''
I. M. Meen''.
On September 6, 2020, over 200 animators
collaborated to reanimate 21 minutes of cutscenes of ''Link: The Faces of Evil'' and ''Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon'' (both 1993).
''Nintendo Wire'' reported, "The ever-shifting mediums and the contrasting animation styles, ranging from professional and sophisticated to intentionally goofy and exaggerated, lend themselves incredibly well to cutscenes that were already chaotic and bizarre to begin with."
References
External links
Как создатели мемных спин-оффов «Зельды» изменили российскую индустрию игр и анимации(lit. How the creators of Zelda's meme spin-offs changed the Russian gaming industry and animations) . DTF. November 25, 2021.
Former Vivendi subsidiaries
Video game companies of Russia
American animation studios
Video game companies established in 1992
Mass media companies established in 1992
Video game companies disestablished in 2001
Mass media companies disestablished in 2001
Defunct video game companies of the United States
Defunct companies based in Maryland
Companies based in Gaithersburg, Maryland
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