Video captures courtesy of EnormousRat and Sierra Games
Background
Sierra was a major PC game developer and publisher, most famous for the King's Quest and Leisure Suit Larry series. It was founded in 1979 by Ken and Roberta Williams as On-Line Systems. The company is best known for pioneering the graphic adventure game genre, including their first such game, Mystery House, which was released in 1980 for the Apple II. In 1982, the company moved to Oakhurst, California and was renamed to Sierra On-Line; this name change was inspired by the near Sierra Nevada mountain range, a part of which was incorporated into their iconic logo as well.
In the late 90's, Sierra passed through a series of acquisitions (by CUC International, then Cendant, which was purchased by Havas). In 1998-99, suffering from financial troubles after its founders left the company, Sierra announced an internal restructuring and major layoffs, which included the division of its operations into five separate brands, and some of its sub-studios to be closed. A year later, Havas became a part of Vivendi and was renamed as Vivendi Universal Publishing; Sierra Entertainment (as it was known by then) was formally disestablished as a company afterwards and continued on as a game publishing brand of Vivendi. In 2008, Vivendi Games merged with Activision Publishing to form Activision Blizzard, who then closed Sierra Entertainment. Despite the original studio's closure, the brand itself was revived in 2014 to release some independently developed games and a reboot of the King's Quest series.
Visuals: On a black background, there is a white line going into a circle. Inside the circle is a white/purple outline of a mountain face, with green trees below it. To the right of it is "Sierra" in a small script font and "ON-LINE INC".
Trivia: The mountain seen in this logo is based off Half Dome in the Yosemite National Park, which is located about 14 miles north of Sierra's headquarters in Oakhurst.
Variants:
On their first title, the logo is in the middle of the title screen.
On the PC port of Wizard and the Princess, the logo draws in on a gray background. Here, the mountain is fully colored and the line and text are pink.
The line and mountain may not be seen.
On later games, the On-Line Systems logo (which is the same except the mountain is gone and the text reads as "ON-LINE systems") appears in a slash formation with 5 other copies. Each of them have "Presents" below them.
Technique: Sprite-based animation.
Audio: Silent or the opening theme to the game.
Availability: Seen on their first titles, like Mystery House. It was also used in tandem with the next logo.
Sierra On-Line
1st Logo (1982-1997)
Visuals: On a black background, a segmented circle is seen with the same mountain face as before, but represented by contrasting segmented lines. Below it is "SIERRA" in Helvetica.
Variants:
Usually, the logo would take up the entire screen, with beveled edges and a shiny look to it. 2 stars ping in time with the music, as well as it occasionally shining. The color differs from game to game, but it's mostly green.
On some games, the logo is on a blue background, with each piece sliding in one by one. The name then appears below letter-by-letter, as well as "PRESENTS".
Sometimes, the logo starts with the picture of an actual mountain (a picture of Half Dome at Yosemite National Park) before morphing to the logo, with the name brightening below.
Later on, the text was modified to a Times New Roman font, and the logo is smaller and placed to the right sometimes.
On other games, a blue furry monster walks in with either the Dynamix logo or byline, before pointing at the logo and saying the name.
On the last games, the logo gained a metallic look to it, as well as the Dynamix logo.
Technique: Sprite-based animation.
Audio: Starting in 1991, a majestic fanfare with strings which ascend, followed by a 4-note trumpet, and two dings when the stars appear. Other than that, it's silent, or a different fanfare, or the opening music of the game.
Availability: Can be seen on most of Sierra's games from the time, most notably the King's Quest series.
2nd Logo (July 11, 1995-1997)
Visuals: Starting off with Half Dome at Yosemite National Park with clouds rolling above, they move around as flashes of lightning brighten it up from the back. The camera then zooms into Half Dome, now with lightning striking it, before it brightens up and a gold circle zooms out slowly to surround it. A duller circle then stops around it, with the second one coming in and with a rainbow coming in from the side. Half Dome becomes gold and the rainbow hits it, turning it into a shining golden Sierra logo. "SIERRA" zooms in from the screen as the light behind it dies down, before popping up again. The logo continues to shine.
Variant: On 1995 installers, the logo appears still with a ping on the top-left. This is likely the very first version of this logo. An abridged version of the standard Sierra tune plays.
Technique: CGI.
Audio: Some dark flutes playing and thunder sounds, ending in a proud orchestral fanfare.
Availability: The still version appears on installers for Sierra games at the time, around circa 1995. The animated version is only known to appear on the Space Quest Collection Series installer.
Final Note: In 1998, Sierra On-Line split its operarions into five different brands and sub-labels - Sierra Attractions, Sierra Home (which was previously used beforehand), Sierra Sports, Sierra FX and Sierra Studios. It wouldn't be until 2001 when all of them (except for Sierra Home) would be under one brand again.
3rd Logo (August 21, 2001-October 4, 2002)
Widescreen version.
SWAT 3: Tactical GOTY Edition variant
Visuals: On a black background, the 1998 Sierra logo ("SIERRA" in a strange font with a wing of spikes on the "S") in a pinkish silver zooms out letter-by-letter, starting with the "A". The logo also shines brightly the entire time.
Variants:
On the GOTY Edition of The Operative: No One Lives Forever and the PS2 port of the same game, the logo is cropped to widescreen.
On the GOTY Edition of SWAT 3: Tactical, a copyright date appears below.
Technique: CGI.
Audio: Several sharp flying sounds, then a small whoosh sound.
Availability: Seen on Arcanum, Alien vs Predator 2, The Throne of Darkness, Empire Earth, the GOTY Edition of SWAT 3: Tactical and the GOTY Edition (PC)/PS2 versions of The Operative: No One Lives Forever.
Sierra Entertainment
1st Logo (February 14, 2002-November 21, 2008)
Standard mountain
Full widescreen version
Logo
Matted logo
Visuals: On a white background is the bottom of a snowy mountain. As the white clears to reveal a blue sky, it reveals the familiar mountain with snow and mist all around the reddish rock. As it zooms out, the background fades to black and the mountain fades to the logo, which is a modified version of the familiar mountain still moving in it. When it stops moving, a flurry of snow comes from the corner and takes the logo with it. It then clears out, with the logo fading back in, along with a modified version of the "SIERRA" text from before (minus the wing).
Trivia: The logo was originally produced in a full 16:9 widescreen ratio, however, every Sierra title would use a cropped 4:3 version, which itself was sometimes cropped into a matted widescreen ratio on some games. The only time you ever get to see the native widescreen version is through the warp-speed version introduced in 2006, and no game ever used the normal logo in native widescreen.
Variants:
Sometimes, the logo freezes before the snow fully dissipates from the screen (if you look closely).
Software released under the Sierra Home label had this logo with the word "Home" in a cursive font. This print variant was used until 2004, when the Sierra Home label was discontinued.
On some games, such as Die Hard: Vendetta, the finished logo fades out early.
A still version exists, with the mountain and text in gold.
A white-background still version is used on Tribes: Vengeance.
On the GBA version of Ice Age 2: The Meltdown, it's a still logo over an icy blue background.
On the NDS version of Ice Age 2: The Meltdown, the still logo is on a royal blue background.
Starting in 2006, the logo plays in warp speed and appears in native widescreen.
However, in some cases, like on Ceasar IV and on The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning (when set to fullscreen), the logo is cropped, like the original slower version of the logo.
Technique: CGI.
Audio: A flute piece, transitioning into a techno beat that grows louder into an orchestral/choir hit, and then a whoosh when the snowflake cloud appears. None or the opening theme of the game for the still variants.
Audio Variants:
The 2006 warp-speed variant uses a condensed version of the soundtrack.
An early version exists where the track is redone. A differently styled flute piece is heard first (kind of like a tribal piece with the additional drum beats), followed by two orchestral hits instead of one. During the former part, the percussion portion is heard before it plays. The choir is also different and after that, a descending chime piece closes out the logo.
On The Lord of the Rings: War of the Ring, the opening theme of the game plays.
On some titles such as SWAT 4, in-game sounds are heard, but these are not part of the video files.
Availability: While the company was merged into Vivendi Universal Games in 2004, this logo was still used until 2008 as a publishing label. Standard version
The first game to use this logo was NASCAR Racing 2002 Season (PC), which used the tribal-style track (it's sequel, NASCAR Racing 2003 Season also uses this track). The first game to use the standard music track was Die Hard: Nakatomi Plaza (PC). The first console game to feature this logo was the North American release of Die Hard: Vendetta for the GameCube (the PAL release, which was also on the PS2 and Xbox, uses the NDA Productions logo).
Appears on its own on titles such as Emperor: Rise of the Middle Kingdom (PC), and F.E.A.R. (PC, plastered out on the GOG.com version).
Appears after the Vivendi Universal Games logo on Homeworld 2 (PC), the European version of Judge Dredd: Dredd vs. Death (PS2/GCN/Xbox/PC), Contract J.A.C.K. (PC), The Hobbit (PS2/GCN/Xbox/PC, with tribal track), Metal Arms: Glitch in the System (PS2/GCN/Xbox), Lords of the Realm III (PC), Ground Control II: Mission Exodus (PC), Evil Genius (PC), Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude (PS2/Xbox/PC, with tribal track) and Robots (PC).
Robots (PS2/GameCube/Xbox), and Predator: Concrete Jungle (PS2/Xbox) pair it with the third logo instead.
It so happens that this logo plasters the third Vivendi Universal Games logo on PAL PS2/Xbox versions of Spyro: A Hero's Tail (all GCN versions, no matter the region, keep the VU Games logo).
It was not used on the original retail releases of Counter-Strike: Condition Zero or Half-Life 2, even though the print logo was present on the packaging. The former game has no opening logos at all, and the latter only has Valve's logo.
Many European titles published by Vivendi Universal use Sierra logos on the packaging (eg, The Simpsons: Hit and Run), but in-game, only the Vivendi Universal Games logo appears.
SWAT: Global Strike Team also uses the Sierra logo on the packaging in all regions, but in-game, only Vivendi Universal Games' logo appears.
Its last console appearance was on Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (PS2/PlayStation 3/Xbox 360/PSP/Wii) while its last appearance overall was on Empire Earth III (PC).
Warp-speed version
First used on Ceasar IV for PC, and appears on almost every Sierra title from this period, including Scarface: The World is Yours (PS2/Xbox/PC/GameCube/Wii), The Legend of Spyro trilogy, the Crash Bandicoot "Titans" duology, the console ports of F.E.A.R., Timeshift, among others.
Crash: Mind Over Mutant (PS2/PS3/Wii/Xbox 360/PSP) and The Legend of Spyro: Dawn of the Dragon (PS2/PS3/PlayStation 3/Xbox 360/Wii) have Activision's logo on NTSC regions, but this logo remains on-screen, with PAL region versions having this logo on the packaging.
Still version
Appears on a small selection of titles, such as Tribes: Arial Assault, Tribes: VengeanceGeometry Wars: Galaxies, and The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor.
This version is more common on GBA and DS titles, appearing on releases such as Ice Age 2: The Meltdown, Eragon, and Crash of the Titans, to name a few.
2nd Logo (July 30, 2014-December 20, 2016)
Visuals: The logo starts with wind blow against a white background as a man clothed in hiking gear, shielding his eyes with his left arm, comes into view. As the wind dies down is the Sierra mountain, and the hiker pauses to view it for a moment before running up to it. The camera zooms out, revealing that the hiker animation comes from a series of blue bars. They come together to form a blue, redesigned version of the Sierra mountain emblem as "SIERRA", in a stylized font resembling the one from before, forms underneath it. When the logo is complete, it flashes blue and some frost blows off of it, and the background changes to vignetted black/blue gradient.
A still version of the finished product appears on the bottom-left corner of the title screen for the iOS version of Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions.
A shorter version of the logo with only the last part of the animation and no byline appears in trailers for Sierra games. The full version without the byline was used in Shiftlings and the 2015-16 King's Quest reboot series, as well as Gasket Studios' Vimeo account.
Technique: CGI by Minneapolis-based VFX agency Gasket Studios.
Audio: Wind blowing sounds are heard throughout the logo. Near the end, there are some whooshes and a deep "boom" (not unlike the 2001 logo) as the logo comes together.
Availability: It was first revealed on Gasket Studios' Vimeo account on July 30, 2014, in preparation of its reveal at Gamescom 2014, and debuted on Geometry Wars 3: Dimensions on November 25. Also seen on the PC and Xbox One versions of Velocity 2X, Shiftlings, and the 2015-16 King's Quest reboot series. It is currently unknown if the Sierra brand will be used in further releases.
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