Ironworks Gaming Forum - Rupert Murdock Buys EIDOS

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- - Rupert Murdock Buys EIDOS (http://www.ironworksforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=93050)

Hoo boy, whats next?

Quote:

Long-awaited deal set to materialise in the next few days as News Corp steps into gaming

Sources at UK publisher Eidos have confirmed that the company is about to be sold to Rupert Murdoch's media empire News Corporation, with the deal expected to be announced within the coming week.

"We're just really glad the News Corp thing is out in the open now," a source at the company told GamesIndustry.biz in the wake of our report yesterday which linked News Corp to the Eidos sale.

"Keep an eye on it over the next week," he continued. "It could happen on Thursday, it could happen on Monday - we're not sure, but there's light at the end of the tunnel now."

Eidos has been very publicly seeking a buyer for some months, and has entered into negotiations with a number of rival publishers - but it's News Corp, which has openly stated its interest in moving into the games market, which is set to sign on the dotted line.

Rumours that a deal was close to being struck initially stemmed from a number of tell-tale signs at the firm's offices - specifically a hiring freeze across the company, and reports that development studios have been told to prepare presentations on each of their projects for the new owners.

The deal is arguably a best case scenario for Eidos, which will be able to continue functioning as a publisher under the News Corporation umbrella - whereas had the firm been sold to a rival publisher, it was widely expected that much of the publishing end of the business would be shut down, with only the valuable IP and studios being retained.

"Everyone within Eidos knows that when it gets sold, it's going to be sold as a group with a new flag on it," our source confirmed this morning. "It's not going to be broken up in the same way Criterion was."

Though as they say, this could work out very well for them.
Waddaya think?

EDIOS will be out of business in 2 years.

Quote:

Originally posted by Ziroc:
EDIOS will be out of business in 2 years.

Chamionship Manager series is under Edios right? I wonder what will happen to that game after this takeover.

Quote:

Originally posted by Dace De'Briago:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Ziroc:
EDIOS will be out of business in 2 years.

I doubt that. Mr Murdoch does everything in his power to dominate the markets that he has interests in. Eidos is a (or rather, was a) major publishing house and is still very well known amongst the gaming community.

With his capital, I imagine that Eidos will soon be producing big hitting and popular titles and will soon be operating with a profit (2 years max). </font>[/QUOTE]Murdoch knows nothing about the gaming arena. He's been shopping around to buy a gaming company for a while now, and edios is it. Mark my words, Edios will be history within 2 years. Murdoch will force Edios to make 'shovelware' like "law and order" TV games.. *groans*

Anytime suits are the ones with the ideas, games suck.

He doesn't need to know the industry inside out, but he can afford to pay people who do [img]smile.gif[/img]

Quote:

Originally posted by Dace De'Briago:
He doesn't need to know the industry inside out, but he can afford to pay people who do [img]smile.gif[/img]

Sure, but it's all about who is RUNNING the show.

I don't see why you think this is such a disaster? I mean, a man who is the owner of The Sun, The times, Harper Collins, Sky Net and Fox can't really botch this much? Originally, Rupert had his eye for either Activision, for 3 billion, or EA for 19 billion. Buying EIDOS kinda surprised me, but I think he saw room for improvement there. And with the amount of cash that guy has I just can't see the company going down in the near future. And EIDOS wasn't really a shining company recent days, and I think this new influx of cash and projects might do good not only for the company, but for the whole games market by increasing the competition.

I'd say all he cares about is that his name is on the product, he leaves the rest to the specialists. Eidos might get an enormous boost out of this. I've seen it before in other types of branches, a moneytycoon steps in, puts the right people in the right place, and things start rolling from there.

The fact that this man has no knowledge about the gaming industry means absolutely nothing. What he does know however, is turning things into profit, which is the bottomline in any type of business.

[ 02-24-2005, 07:03 AM: Message edited by: johnny ]

Quote:

Originally posted by Ziroc:
"law and order" TV games..

Ergh *shudders* Please, that CSI game was soooo dodgy I diddn't even enjoy baking it in the microwave. So a Law and Order game would probably be pretty bad too...