You may know of Embracer Group, the giant Swedish conglomerate that’s made headlines almost entirely off the back of all the studios and other companies they’ve bought over the past couple of years – ranging from Dark Horse Comics and Gearbox Software to the acquisition of Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal from Square Enix earlier this year. Well, they’re at it again, announcing the buy-out of:
- Limited Run Games (physical distributors of many indie and retro games)
- Singtrix (vocal processing technology)
- Gioteck (Gaming accessories)
- Tuxedo Labs (Teardown)
- Tripwire Interactive (Killing Floor, Maneater)
- Bitwave Games (Wunderling DX)
- Tatsujin (Japanese studio headed by the founder of Toaplen, the developer behind Zero Wing and Snow Bros. – acquisition includes Toaplen’s catalogue)
- Middle-earth Enterprises (who owns the entire rights to Lord of the Rings and Hobbit films, video games, board games, merchandising, etc.)
That’s… a lot of properties. Obviously, the Lord of the Rings bit is probably the most striking, considering the franchise’s place in the cultural milieu. Yet, there are other significant bits here, especially in the acquisition of Limited Run Games. This all brings Embracer to 11 operative groups (including the new “Embracer Freemode” consisting of game and entertainment companies), 120 studios, and over 850 franchises under one umbrella. I don’t know if that’s a monopoly, but it sure is some kind of -opoly. What’s the Swedish word for zaibatsu?
Anyway, we’ll report on any other acquisitions the company undertakes going forward, including when they presumably buy the rights to our very existence.
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Written by Amelia Fruzzetti
A writer and Nintendo fan based in Seattle, Washington. When not working for NinWire, she can be found eating pasta, writing stories, and wondering about when Mother 3 is finally going to get an official localization.
