Unlike MicroProse, Firaxis Software aimed at being a "design house", leaving manufacturing, marketing, and distribution of their games to outside contractors. As such, the company talked to six potential video game publishers for their games, and finally signed an agreement with Electronic Arts, through which their games would be distributed under Electronic Arts' Origin Systems label.
The studio's opening was announced on June 24, 1996. Firaxis Software was originally located in a 2,500-square-foot office on Gilroy Road in Hunt Valley, Maryland, temporarily sharing office space. To accommodate their growth, in February 1997, they announced that they were moving their corporate headquarters to a 7,200-square-foot office suite in Executive Plaza III, an office building at 11350 McCormick Road and part of the Hunt Valley Business Community. The deal, assisted by broker William W. Whitty Jr. of MacKenzie/O'Conor, Piper & Flynn Commercial Real Estate Services, was expected to be completed by March that year. The company had 13 employees at the time.
In August 2014, Firaxis Games announced Firaxicon, a convention dedicated to Firaxis games. The event was held from September 27 to 28, 2014, at a hotel in Hunt Valley, and included meet and greets with the company's staff, a presentation titled "An Evening with Sid Meier", and early playtests of Civilization: Beyond Earth. A tour of Firaxis Games' offices was also held at the event. The event was renewed for a second edition in July 2015, and held on October 3, 2015, at the Baltimore Convention Center. Events were similar to that of the 2014 event, with XCOM 2 and Civilization: Beyond Earth – Rising Tide up for early testing.
By December 2015, Firaxis Games expanded their Sparks headquarters, which they moved to in 2009, to 40,000 square feet (3,700 m2), and employed 40 new staff, totaling to 180 employees present at the company. In June 2016, at the Games for Change festival, Firaxis Games announced that they had partnered with GlassLab to develop CivilizationEDU, an educational derivative of Civilization V optimized for classrooms. On July 23, 2018, David Ismailer of 2K confirmed that Firaxis Games was working on a new IP.
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