Trion Worlds has acquired the assets, production materials, licenses, and brands of the development studio Gazillion, which had to close its doors last year.
Asset Purchase by Trion
What did Gazillion develop? The game studio entered into a licensing agreement with Marvel/Disney in 2009 to develop games around the well-known superheroes for ten years. This led to the games Marvel Super Hero Squad Online and Marvel Heroes. Especially Marvel Heroes became known for its Diablo-like gameplay, where you could embody superheroes who fought together against enemies using their powers.
Gazillion Entertainment was closed at the end of 2017, after Disney announced it was ending the partnership with the company.
Trion buys assets. As it has now become known, the game company Trion Worlds has acquired the assets of Gazillion. This means that Trion Worlds now owns all licenses, trademarks, patents, games, technologies, and domains. The deal was apparently completed six months ago but has only now come to light.
What does Trion want to do with the assets? Trion intends to use the acquired assets to further develop its own platform Glyph. The tools for creating isometric MMORPGs are particularly interesting for Trion, as it previously only offered games from a first-person or third-person perspective – including Rift and ArcheAge. The company wants to provide these tools to other developers so they can create their own Iso-MMORPGs.
Studios that use the technology can shorten their development cycles with these tools, thereby accelerating the production of new games. Trion aims to publish these MMORPGs and thus expand its own portfolio.
What does this mean for Marvel Heroes?
Will Marvel Heroes return? Whether anything will happen with the Marvel games is currently unclear, but very unlikely. According to Trion Worlds’ Scott Hartsman, the company first needs to figure out what has happened with the license. Apparently, it was dissolved with the end of the cooperation between Gazillion and Marvel/Disney. Fans should therefore not expect that Marvel Heroes Omega will return. Hartsman states that he is open to discussing the game with Disney/Marvel.
What does Trion say about all of this? “Gazillion was an excellent team with an incredibly talented crew that put a lot of heart into its titles. Some of our current employees were previously there,” says Scott Hartsman, CEO of Trion Worlds. “We regret that Gazillion had to close, but we feel privileged to breathe new life into the results of their hard work – and to offer other developers support that they otherwise would not have.”
“We have developed an excellent ecosystem – to support our games and those we have published. We are excited to equip our library with more tools that help our teams and partners create truly fantastic games,” says Hartsman.
“Our powerful technologies and experience in publishing and operations on a global scale allow us to deliver powerful ‘Ecosystem as a Service’ support and empower developers to create new AAA online experiences from anywhere in the world, assert themselves in crowded markets, and take greater creative risks.”
