The Embracer group is perhaps not as well known as mega conglomerates like EA, Ubisoft, Square Enix, Sony and Microsoft but over the last few years it has been steadily acquiring rights to all manner of game companies, entertainment properties (late last year they also got Dark Horse comics) and other such feeder industries. They are however massive now with some very big names and rights https://gbatemp.net/threads/square-...ips-to-embracer-group-for-300-million.611677/
Today they announced they had acquired the rights to the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit non book content (Harper Collins has that) by purchase of "Middle-earth Enterprises" which you might have known by its previous name of Tolkien enterprises, from its current owner the Saul Zaentz Company who had put them up for sale in February this year https://variety.com/2022/film/news/lord-of-the-rings-hobbit-tolkien-zaentz-rights-sale-1235176036/ .
Press release which contains some more info than is quoted here
https://embracer.com/release/embrac...d-the-hobbit-literary-works-by-j-r-r-tolkien/
No price has been given and with the rest of the acquisitions here also being not disclosed then teasing out a price from investor reports or upcoming meetings might be easier said than done.
The rights to Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit are also of interest at present with Amazon's upcoming (and much maligned by the community in trailers and pre release hype) Rings of Power that is contractually obliged to stick to the contents of Silmarillion (a compendium of history of the world rather than a generally cohesive story) and not what is in the other books. A concept normally seen more in either public domain works where only the concepts seen in works in the public domain are allowed, or in some cases comic films where rights to different franchises might be split between companies where the source comics have crossovers all the time (Scarlet witch and Quicksilver popularised in the Avengers films are actually originally xmen, sometimes children of series big antagonist Magneto for instance, not the avengers films would make any reference there). In games you might have also seen it in how Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor does not mention Lord of the Rings (said games are made by Monolith Productions who are owned by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment who are themselves presently merging with Discovery), and it is unknown what this will do to any rereleases or sequels for those games. Warner Brothers also variously has interests in the lego themed lord of the rings and hobbit titles, war in the north and several more.
The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is entirely separate company and presumably a work in progress, though acquisitions like this have stopped things in the final hour before, especially if quality standards have not been met. Lord of the Rings Online is presently handled by an independent company called Daybreak Game Company. Most of the PS2-gamecube era games based on the films were under EA's banner and rights were complicated then. Either way to a casual scan then despite the Embracer group's considerable catalogue of devs then none have particular previous ties to any middle earth computer game properties (much less any in recent decades), though Asmodee (who they bought in late 2021) have some experience with board games and card games based in the world.
Some of those are probably too far along to break up but after that then... could be interesting as we have all seen acquisitions like this before result in things going in house (see EA with Star Wars games, or indeed what Microsoft's own buying sprees are potentially going to yield). As public domain was mentioned then The Hobbit was published in 1937, while The Lord of the Rings was 1954. 1926 was this year for US public domain ( https://gbatemp.net/threads/new-in-the-public-domain-for-2022.605453/ ) which means assuming current expiry dates are held then about 10 years until you can freely make your own Hobbit game if you wanted, rather more for Lord of the Rings and as 1977 was the Silmarillion then yeah.
Other acquisitions announced today include Tripwire interactive
https://embracer.com/release/embracer-group-enters-into-agreement-to-acquire-tripwire-interactive/
https://gbatemp.net/review/killing-floor-2.542/
Tuxedo labs
https://embracer.com/release/embracer-group-acquires-tuxedo-labs/
Teardown is their only game to date but it is fairly highly regarded.
Singtrix
https://embracer.com/release/embracer-group-enters-into-an-agreement-to-acquire-singtrix/
Tech company but tech behind some of Guitar hero and vocal processing (likely to be important in the future, if nothing else as a patent war chest).
Limited run games.
They are quite famous for making physical versions of otherwise download only titles in a limited run, though more recently have also done things like Doom Eternal for the Switch https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2...nd-ultimate-physical-switch-editions-revealed
brought back Scott Pilgrim which was previously in rights hell, some physical "mini console" type things https://gbatemp.net/threads/sega-astro-city-mini-released-by-limited-run-games.585385/
They have previously also held their own E3 presentations https://gbatemp.net/threads/limited-run-games-e3-presentation.507077/ .
https://embracer.com/release/embracer-group-enters-into-an-agreement-to-acquire-limited-run-games/
Another group was announced, their 11th, in this case Embracer Freemode that is also set to house the Lord of the Rings stuff above it seems.
https://embracer.com/release/embracer-group-announces-the-11th-operating-group-embracer-freemode/
Today they announced they had acquired the rights to the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit non book content (Harper Collins has that) by purchase of "Middle-earth Enterprises" which you might have known by its previous name of Tolkien enterprises, from its current owner the Saul Zaentz Company who had put them up for sale in February this year https://variety.com/2022/film/news/lord-of-the-rings-hobbit-tolkien-zaentz-rights-sale-1235176036/ .
Press release which contains some more info than is quoted here
https://embracer.com/release/embrac...d-the-hobbit-literary-works-by-j-r-r-tolkien/
No price has been given and with the rest of the acquisitions here also being not disclosed then teasing out a price from investor reports or upcoming meetings might be easier said than done.
embracer group press release said:
The rights to Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit are also of interest at present with Amazon's upcoming (and much maligned by the community in trailers and pre release hype) Rings of Power that is contractually obliged to stick to the contents of Silmarillion (a compendium of history of the world rather than a generally cohesive story) and not what is in the other books. A concept normally seen more in either public domain works where only the concepts seen in works in the public domain are allowed, or in some cases comic films where rights to different franchises might be split between companies where the source comics have crossovers all the time (Scarlet witch and Quicksilver popularised in the Avengers films are actually originally xmen, sometimes children of series big antagonist Magneto for instance, not the avengers films would make any reference there). In games you might have also seen it in how Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor does not mention Lord of the Rings (said games are made by Monolith Productions who are owned by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment who are themselves presently merging with Discovery), and it is unknown what this will do to any rereleases or sequels for those games. Warner Brothers also variously has interests in the lego themed lord of the rings and hobbit titles, war in the north and several more.
The Lord of the Rings: Gollum is entirely separate company and presumably a work in progress, though acquisitions like this have stopped things in the final hour before, especially if quality standards have not been met. Lord of the Rings Online is presently handled by an independent company called Daybreak Game Company. Most of the PS2-gamecube era games based on the films were under EA's banner and rights were complicated then. Either way to a casual scan then despite the Embracer group's considerable catalogue of devs then none have particular previous ties to any middle earth computer game properties (much less any in recent decades), though Asmodee (who they bought in late 2021) have some experience with board games and card games based in the world.
.further excerpt from press release said:
Some of those are probably too far along to break up but after that then... could be interesting as we have all seen acquisitions like this before result in things going in house (see EA with Star Wars games, or indeed what Microsoft's own buying sprees are potentially going to yield). As public domain was mentioned then The Hobbit was published in 1937, while The Lord of the Rings was 1954. 1926 was this year for US public domain ( https://gbatemp.net/threads/new-in-the-public-domain-for-2022.605453/ ) which means assuming current expiry dates are held then about 10 years until you can freely make your own Hobbit game if you wanted, rather more for Lord of the Rings and as 1977 was the Silmarillion then yeah.
Other acquisitions announced today include Tripwire interactive
https://embracer.com/release/embracer-group-enters-into-agreement-to-acquire-tripwire-interactive/
https://gbatemp.net/review/man-eater.1402/press release said:
https://gbatemp.net/review/killing-floor-2.542/
Tuxedo labs
https://embracer.com/release/embracer-group-acquires-tuxedo-labs/
Teardown is their only game to date but it is fairly highly regarded.
Singtrix
https://embracer.com/release/embracer-group-enters-into-an-agreement-to-acquire-singtrix/
Tech company but tech behind some of Guitar hero and vocal processing (likely to be important in the future, if nothing else as a patent war chest).
Limited run games.
They are quite famous for making physical versions of otherwise download only titles in a limited run, though more recently have also done things like Doom Eternal for the Switch https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2...nd-ultimate-physical-switch-editions-revealed
brought back Scott Pilgrim which was previously in rights hell, some physical "mini console" type things https://gbatemp.net/threads/sega-astro-city-mini-released-by-limited-run-games.585385/
They have previously also held their own E3 presentations https://gbatemp.net/threads/limited-run-games-e3-presentation.507077/ .
https://embracer.com/release/embracer-group-enters-into-an-agreement-to-acquire-limited-run-games/
Another group was announced, their 11th, in this case Embracer Freemode that is also set to house the Lord of the Rings stuff above it seems.
https://embracer.com/release/embracer-group-announces-the-11th-operating-group-embracer-freemode/
An odd choice for some of those companies but does a hardware maker, a bunch of classic games publishers and something that might well manage distribution and QA (all more than just some financial arrangement) mean some kind of mini consoles (limited run games noted above also has history here) or at least a massive push to explore the now extensive back catalogue that Embracer group has?press release said:
