I worked for Lightspan from 2003-2005. The company designed, programmed, produced, marketed & sold the games in house, from one pretty big office building in San Diego, CA. We had nearly 400 employees in our own four-floor building. All of the artwork and voice-acting. It was a great place to work, and I do think that the programs were received well by students. I remember the packages costing anywhere from $20k-$50k, but most or all of that cost was usually covered by education grants. It was a classic example of an education resource company understanding that they could create a product that schools would be given specific grants to purchase.
The characters created were pretty cool, a whole range of (usually) animals, including Mortimer Moose (we had a mascot outfit built for trade shows and school visits).
Playstation details: We started using traditional PS1 consoles & controllers. The original games were shipped in a special case/box, inside sleeves within the box. Usually there was a carrying case for the box/PS1, but I remember it being a plain blue/red nylon bag with handles. At some point we added an embroidered Lightspan logo. We started with about two dozen games, and by the time we wrapped up shop we had created close to 60. Most of them were traditional "map" games with worlds to explore with mathematical, scientific & English puzzles to solve. The graphics were good, but not 3D, and they were very dated by the time the PS2 came out.
Two interesting PS tid-bits: we designed a take-home version of the system, using the smaller version of the PS1 coupled with a non-Sony built 6 or 8 inch monitor that attached to the back. The idea was that students could check-out a PS + software from their teacher, take it home for the weekend, play games, and bring it back to school on Monday. Of course, there was no way for us to stop the system from playing other, non-educational PS games. That program was nixed before it ever reached full production.
We also began playing with the first PS2 systems to see if we could incorporate the technology into our program. We were thinking about a more sophisticated line of games when we were purchased by Plato Learning of St. Paul, MN. Within six months, we had downsized from 375 employees to 75. I was put in charge of emptying the building (literally) of all equipment, furniture & electronics. It was sad to see so many co-workers go, but most of them found work rather quickly, as we had a a mini game-design boom in SD at the time.
I ended up taking home almost 50 PS1 systems (a mix of the original and new designs) a dozen or so brand new 6-8" mini-screen attachments, several dozen controllers & a half-dozen computers from the design department. Most interestingly for you guys, I was also in charge of emptying our "game cage", where we stored our testing/trade show discs & games in production. I believe we also collected nearly 200 game discs that were left around the building in various capacities. In all, I took home almost 300 Lightspan games, most of them in their original cases & sleeves.
I sold most of these items on e-Bay (2004-2005). I didn't know what to expect, but the newer PS1's w/attaching screens sold for nearly $100 each. The games themselves sold pretty well, too. There were other Lightspan products in auctions, so there were some small bidding wars. I believe that the sets (series of discs in certain subjects, ranging from 3-6 discs) were selling for about $20 each. A few of the rare discs (I don't remember the titles) sold for $25-35 a disc. It was fun to see that folks were still interested in the games (although the guys at the local video game stores certainly weren't!).
How is this for perspective: the company made nearly $50 million dollars in 2003, and our CEO was paid about $420,000 that year. In the end, after the sale to PLATO Learning (for about $50 million), it was my responsibility to get rid of ANYTHING that wasn't taken to the new, 75 employee office. In total, I gave away nearly $10,000 worth of office furniture & equipment. I was forced (by time contraints- we NEEDED to empty the 4,500 square foot building) to throw away another $10,000 worth of furniture & supplies. On the last day, we discovered a closet holding almost 200 reams of paper. Most of that went into the recycling dumpster.
In the end, I sold the PS equipment & games for a little under $1,000. I told PLATO Learning that most of the checks were written in my name. They told me they had no idea what I was talking about, and didn't care about where the equipment had gone. I was shocked.
There were also multiple projectors and computers that were thrown into the trash. Some of the employees took to breaking their equipment so that PLATO couldn't use it. Turns out, they had their own, and didn't want it anyway. Crazy!
-Bilbo
(I don't know where the PS2's went. They disappeared one night, as we had hired several temp employees to help empty the building. Several laptops from our sales force, which were being shipped to Minnesota for deletion and re-sale, also disappeared. It was very strange to see the company disappear so quickly.)
