It
seems as though the fiasco that was the handling
of the Infinity Ward situation by Activision
may have a silver lining for the company,
its shareholders and the gaming community.
If this announcement took place on April
1st it would most definitely been rule an
April Fools prank, but the news was released
on April 30th that Activision and Bungie,
the creators of the Halo franchise for Microsoft
have entered into a 10-year partnership.
As
part of the agreement Activision will receive
exclusive worldwide rights to publish
all of Bungie’s games, including the
super secret double probation masterpiece
that is under wraps and will more than likely
be announced at the Activision press conference
at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3)
in June in Los Angeles.
The deal will also
see Bungie’s Xbox
exclusivity reign come to an abrupt halt
as Activision made it clear that it intends
on publishing Bungie’s upcoming titles
on all gaming platforms.
In what was a call
to arms for Infinity Ward, it seems as though
Bungie will get
something out of their deal that Infinity
Ward did not, and that is the agreement stipulates
that Bungie will remain and independent company
and will retain all rights to its intellectual
property. Bungie’s Harold Ryan, pictured
here noted that the two companies have been
working on a deal for the last nine months.
Activision took a public relations hit and
the good ship Activision started to list
like the Titanic, but they have righted the
ship with the media and investors and further
fueled the fire of animosity between the
creators of the best selling game in the
history of the video game business (Infinity
Ward creators of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare
2).
We’ll keep you posted on any and all
developments with this story.
