WaltC said:
I thought I read awhile back that Interplay was selling its BG license to Bioware, or did I totally misread whatever it is that I recall reading?...
Atari was suing them over not making payments on D&D licensed game and they were in danger of losing their BG rights because of it. Herve said in the 10-K they were in danger of losing that, and it looks like yesterday, they did.
Also, I think the idea of Atari and Vivendi "putting the screws" to Interplay is laughable, really. If Vivendi and Atari pick and fund the same kinds of losing propositions that Interplay has run with for years, they'll end up sharing the same fate, without question.
Interplay does have some intellectual property other companies might want. Those companies may not the whole package of Interplay, including the employees and any contractual obligations to those employees, Interplay's debt, any contractual problems Interplay has with another corporation, and so forth. If you're just interested in one or two of their properties, you don't want to pay for all of them and have the baggage that comes with it.
For example, Atari might be interested in the rights to the BG games. They have the rights to the name, and they have the rights to D&D, but they don't have the rights to the characters and story created by BioWare under Interplay. If Atari wanted to make BG3, which they do, and they wanted to continue with the characters seen in the first games, they'd need that license.
They can wait for Interplay to die, which we all know is going to happen at this point, or they can help that process along because Interplay is hardly self reliant. They rely on Vivendi to distribute their games for them, and Vivendi's been delaying the release of their games since last year. They delayed Lionheart's release by saying they wanted more time to advertise it. Then they didn't advertise it or take it to E3. They delayed Fallout Enforcer several month until it was up against games like Legends of Norrath from Sony. Atari did the same thing with IWD2 and BG: DA2, saying things like the elves weren't the right height in the games.
I mean, when you put the screws to yourself, no one else is required to do that, are they?
Think of it as pulling the plug on your diabetic grandpa who ate nothing but tootsie roll pops every day in order to fight for the inherence.
Also, if you want multiple properties from Interplay, you can get them cheaper at a liquidation auction than you can just buying them from the failing company.
It's pretty simple, I think: you fund good games people want enough to buy in quantity and you'll succeed--you don't and you won't. Cut & dried. Doesn't matter what you publish, be it books or software.
And that's the thing. People wanted Fallout 3, Interplay hands out Fallout Enforcer. People wanted BG3, Interplay gives them BG:DA2. The problem with Interplay isn't that they don't have good licenses with name recognition and the possibility to sell well. The problem with them is that they have those licenses and think making low budget console crap with them will make them rich. Titus was doing the same thing, and now they're broke too.
Heck, Vivendi likes the steady trickle of income Fallout and Fallout 2 generate. It's been selling steadily for the last few years. They'd have a bigger slice of that pie if they owned the rights all by themselves.
