Disney executives want to get ahead in the video game industry. They want to leapfrog through the process by acquiring Electronic Arts or a company on that scale. According to a Bloomberg report, Disney executives want the company’s CEO Bob Iger to transform the company from a video game licensee to a publisher.
Mickey Mouse’s mascot company used to be a video game publisher. However, that era ended in 2016 with the closure of Disney Infinity studio. Subsequently, the company turned to a licensing model where it struck deals with developers that wanted to use its IPs.
Some games that Disney has recently licensed include Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, Disney Illusion Island, and Return to Monkey Island. Other upcoming releases also licensed by Disney include Star Wars: Outlaws, Spider-Man 2, Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, and Indiana Jones.
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At the moment, it is said that Iger is “noncommittal” about the acquisition. Nevertheless, Disney and EA have enjoyed a cordial relationship over the last eight years. EA secured exclusive rights to make “core” Star Wars games in 2013. That led to the reboot of DICE’s Star Wars Battlefront series and Respawn Entertainment’s Star Wars Jedi series.
There are reports that EA and Disney talked about the acquisition last year. However, rumors have it that EA also discussed the same topic with several companies including Apple, Amazon, and NBCUniversal. So far, talks with NBCUniversal have broken down.
EA’s IP licensing relationship with Disney extends to Marvel. Cliffhanger Games and Motive Studios, both subsidiaries of EA, are believed to be working on single-player projects that involve several Marvel characters.
EA CEO refuted previous acquisition talks
After the news went viral that NBCUniversal’s plan to acquire EA had fallen apart, EA CEO Andrew Wilson refuted the claims. Wilson maintained that the company was in an “incredible position”. He even made a bold claim that EA was on track to be “the largest stand-alone independent developer and publisher of interactive entertainment in the world”.
A lot has happened after his statement including the mass layoff of hundreds of employees, the cancellation of a single-player Apex Legends spinoff, and the cancellation of Apex Legend and Battlefield mobile games. What is particularly interesting is that the layoffs came after the company declared “strong” profits.
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Some of the employees laid off from BioWare, a subsidiary of EA, have dragged the company to court for unfair treatment and paltry severance packages. This series of events suggests that the company’s ship may not be sailing as smoothly as at the time Wilson made those comments.
Disney executives appear desperate in their ambition
Once upon a time, some Disney IPs were reserved for big developers. It may not have been boldly written anywhere but we imagine the entertainment giant would easily decline licensing their IP to indie developers. However, that seems to have changed as the company pushes to have a stronger presence in the video game industry.
Disney has been fighting their way back into the video game space. In a 2021 interview with GamesIndustry.biz, Sean Shoptaw, the Senior Vice President, Global Games & Interactive Experiences said the exit of Disney from publishing was not a defeat, but rather, “a new ambition to go into this space in a more robust way”.
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GamesIndustry.biz reported that in recent times Disney has emphasized that no IP is off-limits to indie developers. This shows how far Disney is willing to go to expand its presence in the video game industry. After seeing the drama in Microsoft’s planned acquisition of Activision, we believe anything is possible—including EA becoming a subsidiary of Disney someday.
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