Electronic Arts today announced that the critically acclaimed Redwood Shores development studio will live on under a new and edgier moniker: Visceral Games.

A press release from the mega publisher defends the decision by saying the change was necessary “to better reflect the studio’s culture, identity and focus on creating intense action-oriented intellectual properties.”

A sugar coated way of saying the name Redwood Shores wasn’t bad-ass enough to spawn titles containing the aforesaid bad-assery.

Redwood Shores created the painfully horrific Dead Space under the old name and is currently working on Dante’s Inferno and Dead Space: Extraction-the Wii prequel to be published with the more sensible Visceral brand name.  What’s more is that Visceral is also working on two other “unannounced titles”-ooh la la.

“Action, intensity, excellence. It isn’t just in our DNA, it’s in our blood,” said Glen Schofield, VP and GM of Visceral Games. “For the past two years, we have adopted a new culture that prizes excellence above all else. Primal action is the beating heart of the studio and now our new name reflects that.”

Eddie Makuch is Blast's Director of Video Game News. Reach him at Makuch.E@BlastMagazine.com.