Embracer Group acquires Square Enix's Western studios and IPs (Deus Ex, Thief, Tomb Raider, etc)

[DeepOcean]

On another time I would be mildly interested someone buying the Deus Ex franchise from Square Enix but knowing how embracer is fucking up Saints Row pretty bad, I just dont expect anything from it.

 

[Ismaul]

Deus Ex?

Embracer making itself attractive in order to be embraced by Elon?

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

In before THQ Nordic hires a developer to create an open world Thief game.

Thief could work as "open world" provided the world was a single city that functioned as a hub with procedural generated houses as filler between the actual levels. Would be a lot of work to make it something other than just an artificial extender.

Thief III: Deadly Shadows (2004) already moved in the direction of providing an urban environment that needed to be traversed to reach the mission locations, with a few shops and optional looting of buildings. If sufficient funding were provided for a Thief IV: Garrett Returns, it would be possible to create a sizeable, hand-crafted City, though making use of this creation would require a departure from the customary gameplay of the Thief trilogy, which was based around missions in isolated zones.

 

[Assisted Living Godzilla]

This doesn't seem like much of a surprise. From the sound of it these studios were huge drains on Square Enix, spent like crazy, had little return, and were the place they were losing money most. I'm just a little surprised they let them (mostly speaking IP here) go for just $300 million, but I guess that just speaks to how much they wanted those studios gone.

I'm not sure why anyone would think this would change much of anything with regard to the quality of games these studios put out, it's not like Square Enix forced Crystal Dynamics to make that Marvel Avengers game suck.

Did find it kind of funny I saw an article that assumed that "over 50 back catalogue game" included the Marvel stuff. I'd guess Square Enix (who has a relationship with Disney) is just going to handle future Marvel games with their Japanese studios. There wouldn't be any reason for them to let that separate deal go just because they had their Western studios make the comic book games.

Methinks this move will clear the way for Square-Enix getting nestled like a Russian doll into Sony.

You don't unload IP before a buyout.

 

[<3sRichardSimmons]

it's not like Square Enix forced Crystal Dynamics to make that Marvel Avengers game suck.

Way too obvious in your trolling there dude.

 

[Paul_cz]

embracer is fucking up Saints Row

Embracer has nothing to do with direction of Saints Row, they are hands off.
Also, Saints Row looks fine, reveal was lame but the game is as Saints Row as it gets.

 

[Deflowerer]

I would love to see remasters and remakes of beloved classics. A 3D remake of Blood Omen would be really nice.

I expect them to do a more budget remake to test the waters for the franchise, ie a top-down but with new 3D assets, although with BO1 they could probably take a gamble to make it more ambitious since it might as well be a new game in this day and age.

 

[JarlFrank]

embracer is fucking up Saints Row

Embracer has nothing to do with direction of Saints Row, they are hands off.

Exactly, that's why them buying Tomb Raider probably means nothing. Crystal Dynamics already made the first reboot (Legend trilogy) which was a step away from classic TR story and character wise (they gave Lara daddy issues lol), and the second reboot trilogy went away from classic TR in gameplay too.

Since Crystal Dynamics gets to keep making TR games, they're just gonna keep going in the same direction.

 

[Wirdschowerdn]

You don't unload IP before a buyout.

Why not? It makes an acquisition a lot cheaper now.

 

[Gargaune]

In before THQ Nordic hires a developer to create an open world Thief game.

Thief could work as "open world" provided the world was a single city that functioned as a hub with procedural generated houses as filler between the actual levels. Would be a lot of work to make it something other than just an artificial extender.

Thief III: Deadly Shadows (2004) already moved in the direction of providing an urban environment that needed to be traversed to reach the mission locations, with a few shops and optional looting of buildings. If sufficient funding were provided for a Thief IV: Garrett Returns, it would be possible to create a sizeable, hand-crafted City, though making use of this creation would require a departure from the customary gameplay of the Thief trilogy, which was based around missions in isolated zones.

Didn't LGS originally intend for Thief to be a contiguous adventure featuring a city hub? I was under the impression that the isolated mission structure was due to budgeting constraints on the first project, and ISA's later work on Deadly Shadows was trying to bring some cut design elements back into the mix.

 

[toughasnails]

I think you mean Dark Avalon which was supposed to be an open world RPG set in large steampunk city, Thief was built on the ruins of that project.

Speaking of open world Thief the hub in the failed 2014 reboot was one of few decent things about it, especially compared to the hub in Deadly Shadows which was interesting early on but in the end it was more of a chore to traverse between missions and felt more like a way to extend the game's length.

I would love to see remasters and remakes of beloved classics. A 3D remake of Blood Omen would be really nice.

I'd love to see one for Soul Reaver, a remake which would kept the art direction and the story but featured redesigned combat and either cut on the block pushing puzzles or replaced some of them with different, less repetitive and tedious types of puzzles would be great.

 

[Parsifarka]

Great, so chances are Lara will be even uglier should they ever drag her mangled corpse from underneath the ruins of the latest money sinker. Maybe we even get Laura Cruz next time; on a positive note, this probably means the deal for a movie sequel with that hideous tranny has fallen through.

 

[DJOGamer PT]

From the sound of it these studios were huge drains on Square Enix, spent like crazy, had little return, and were the place they were losing money most.

Oh you mean Final Fantasy?

The difference between how Squeenix managed it's Western studios vs it's Japanese ones, was nothing short of retarded

On the Nippon side you have:
- studios enjoying great freedom of development
- shitty remarsters
- sequel bloat
- FF14 given a full redevolepment, despite being dogshit and a financial bomb
- FF15 taking 10 years (and 2/3 complete redesigns) to release, burning millions each year, only to turn out one of the most mediocre FF titles
- the shameless cashgrab that is FF7 Remake, divisive even among FF fanboys

And despite all this, these games only had a modicum of "success" in fucking Japan and S. Korea

While on the Western side, the devs were faced with:
- extensive micromanagement from Squeenix
- unchangable deadlines
- unrealistic goals
- harsher crunch time
- small funding comparatively to their eastern cousins

However the western side of Squeenix has the one that had regular success (even if it didn't meet the japs hilarious expectations) and actual appeal outside east asia

Yet for the last 10 years, Squeenix used their western projects as a scapegoat for their every fuck up

 

[toughasnails]

Thief should be made in the mold of the new Hitman games, but with less lethal objectives.

If you mean their episodic model, it could be something like one city district serving as a hub with one or two main missions and some content per episode. Or have one central hub with new episodes adding new main missions and side content to it. I could see that working.

 

[ironmask]

I guess it would be kinda cool if they got nightdive for a thief remaster. But tbh I wouldn't really care, I kinda see it as pointless since we already have NewDark for thief 1 and 2. If someone wanted better graphics then they could just download the HD texture pack. Thief 3 is the only one that would probably benefit from a remastered. That game runs like ass on today's hardware. I just wonder if they do make a new thief game one day, then will they make it a sequel to thief 2014 or the thief trilogy? Or could it just be a reboot again. I feel like another reboot is most likely.

 

[Wirdschowerdn]

Why would anyone want a Thief remaster? We already got NewDark.

Hands off!

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Thief is only 8 years old, it doesn't need a remaster yet anyways

 

[Blutwurstritter]

I think the hub in Thief 3 was a bad decision, they clearly didn't have the resources for it. It wasn't completely horrible but the game would have been better had they spent the time on the missions, instead of wasting it on the city hub. The effort should be put 100% into well designed missions/maps and not into some pointless open world garbage. You can have city sections as missions or interludes themselves but please don't force me to walk the same hub/open world section every single time when I want to start the next mission.

 

[Gargaune]

I think you mean Dark Avalon which was supposed to be an open world RPG set in large steampunk city, Thief was built on the ruins of that project.

Same project, really, the original Dark Camelot design kept getting pared down and focused until we got Thief: The Dark Project. Skimming over what got cut, it seems the initial concept was broader, more like what Deus Ex delivered later. What I meant is that Thief 3's limited iteration with the city hub and faction reputation was probably not entirely alien to the Thief concept.

 

[Dodo1610]

Even the original Dark Project was not a best seller.
So the only thing they could do with The Thief IP is give it to some tiny indie team.

 

[J1M]

I think you mean Dark Avalon which was supposed to be an open world RPG set in large steampunk city, Thief was built on the ruins of that project.

Same project, really, the original Dark Camelot design kept getting pared down and focused until we got Thief: The Dark Project. Skimming over what got cut, it seems the initial concept was broader, more like what Deus Ex delivered later. What I meant is that Thief 3's limited iteration with the city hub and faction reputation was probably not entirely alien to the Thief concept.

I was referring to the level structure that provides a wide space to experiment in with objectives that can be met in a variety of ways.

Here's a video for those who are unfamiliar with the newer Hitman games:

 

[toughasnails]

Why would anyone want a Thief remaster? We already got NewDark.

Hands off!

As I said earlier

Console versions.
Also, even on PC, have you noticed how many people played Quake only once the official remaster came out on Steam even though source ports were available for aeons.
HD remasters could potentially attract new fans on PC and consoles alike so at least for that they'd be a good thing.

I assume that, if ND were the ones doing the remasters, it would run on Kex . But if the original source was accessible they could also release that independently of the remaster so that the fans could tinker with the original engine, expand it... That would surely be great news for the FM makers too.

 

[S.torch]

From the sound of it these studios were huge drains on Square Enix, spent like crazy, had little return, and were the place they were losing money most.

Oh you mean Final Fantasy?

The difference between how Squeenix managed it's Western studios vs it's Japanese ones, was nothing short of retarded

On the Nippon side you have:
- studios enjoying great freedom of development
- shitty remarsters
- sequel bloat
- FF14 given a full redevolepment, despite being dogshit and a financial bomb
- FF15 taking 10 years (and 2/3 complete redesigns) to release, burning millions each year, only to turn out one of the most mediocre FF titles
- the shameless cashgrab that is FF7 Remake, divisive even among FF fanboys

And despite all this, these games only had a modicum of "success" in fucking Japan and S. Korea

While on the Western side, the devs were faced with:
- extensive micromanagement from Squeenix
- unchangable deadlines
- unrealistic goals
- harsher crunch time
- small funding comparatively to their eastern cousins

However the western side of Squeenix has the one that had regular success (even if it didn't meet the japs hilarious expectations) and actual appeal outside east asia

Yet for the last 10 years, Squeenix used their western projects as a scapegoat for their every fuck up

Just say that you want to believe the Japs are the ones responsible for these games turning to crap, despite the fact that western industry has demonstrated time and time again they don't need an excuse to suck beyond any expectation xd

 

[lycanwarrior]

Sony’s Big Rumored Acquisition Was Square Enix, Says Grubb:

https://wccftech.com/sony-big-rumored-acquisition-was-square-enix-says-grubb/

 

[Gargaune]

Sony’s Big Rumored Acquisition Was Square Enix, Says Grubb:

https://wccftech.com/sony-big-rumored-acquisition-was-square-enix-says-grubb/

Sounds like those Eidos IPs just dodged a bullet.