News Activision, Vivendi Universal merge

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2007/12/03/activision_vivendi_universal_merge/1

Out of nowhere two of the biggest publishers in games have united - bringing Call of Duty, Tony Hawks, Guitar Hero and World of Warcraft all under one roof.

 

with EA eating up the market also things could turn out real interesting with only a handful of publishers left

 

seconded, anythign that keeps EA away from eating another company is a good move.

 

Wait a minute there... isn't it blizzard and Activision that merged and Vivendi hold controlling stake in the new company and the company will be headed by Activision current CEO

 

+1

 

+2 EA either needs a reality check, or sell off their PC division to somebody that actually cares about the PC market.

 

So we'll end up with such classic titles as: Blizzard presents: Tony Hawks World of World War 2 Craft - The mmo, then?

 

They should have called it Actiblivizzardsion. Much better than Activision Blizzard

Oh and: "News is still trickling through on how the merger may effect the future of other games...". Sorry I'm obviously being a typo Nazi today.

 

or the new skateboard mount on WoW! =)

 

But there ends up only being 3-4 publishers total... how good are the games going to be? Is this better for them or for everyone?

 

According to Blizzard this changes nothing as far as their dev teams go.

 

there are more publishers i think.....

 

publishers and developers are two different thing so I doubt it would change anything

 

I thought the biggest publisher was Take 2 Interactive.

 

What's the difference between them? Publishers make discs? Developers make games?

EA develops and makes (like the discs) games, and are the biggest (that I'm aware of)
I don't know the other biggie's, or if there are really any other players

 

Tt seems that Sony Computer Entertainment America Inc. might actually be the world's biggest publisher/developer of games, although this arm does include profits from and development for the PlayStation hardware.

 

google + wikipedia Cheesecake
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_publisher#Selected_video_game_publishers

Nintendo - #1
EA - #2
Activision - #3
Then Ubisoft, THQ and Tt, Sega of America, Sony, Microsoft

So Tt and Sony are quite low down, im surprised Ninty got the #1 spot though (EA was #1 in 2006)

 

Arigato. Very coor.

I think the "quality of products" criteria was an influence in Nintendo taking #1 from EA.