10 Video Game Studios Killed By Electronic Arts
8. Origin Systems (1983 - 2004)
The oldest developer on this list, Origin Systems was founded by brothers Richard and Robert Garriott, father Owen Garriott and Richard's high school friend Chuck Bueche in 1983. They're best known for developing the Ultima series, the Wing Commander series and System Shock.
The studio was bought by EA in 1992, and by 1996 their small 50 employee studio now had over 300 people working for them. Unfortunately for Origin, all this would change following the release of one of their most successful games Ultima Online, arguably the godfather of MMOs.
Eventually however it was Ultima Online's success that caused Origin to go under, as EA forced them to focus on supporting Ultima Online and cancelled all of their upcoming projects so they could concentrate entirely on new MMO-inspired IPs.
Following the release of Ultima IX, EA shut the studio down in February 2004 - only a month after shutting down Maxis. It's thought that the poor sales of Ultima IX led to the studios closure, but considering how much of a money cow Ultima Online was it's hard to see how one bad game could have closed such a successful and storied developer.