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Lionsgate Makes ‘Significant Investment’ In Telltale Games
Update #2: In addition to the appointment of Lionsgate CEO Jon Feltheimer to the Telltale board, the developer has another governance announcement. Unity CEO John Riccitiello (formerly of Electronic Arts) has also been named to the studio's board of directors.
Update #1: There's a bit more information about how Telltale and Lionsgate will be working together.
Speaking with Entertainment Weekly, Telltale CEO Kevin Bruner discusses his studio's concept for a "super show." The plan is to integrate a single story across television and game segments to create a single episode of a "super show."
Because of development cycles, the episodes will be spaced further apart than television shows. Telltale says it will be shooting for predictable schedules, something that hasn't always been the case for its releases due to certification across a number of platforms. The first such endeavor will be an original IP. The complete interview is available at Entertainment Weekly.
Original Story:
Lionsgate, which last year announced plans to expand into games, has a new partner. The film company has made a “significant investment” in The Walking Dead and The Wolf Among Us developer Telltale Games.
Telltale, which currently has two titles mid-season (Tales from the Borderlands and Game of Thrones) also recently announced a partnership with Microsoft and Mojang to create a standalone Minecraft story.
The amount of the investment was not disclosed, but it’s significant enough to warrant placement of a Lionsgate executive on Telltale’s board of directors. Lionsgate CEO Jon Feltheimer will be joining the developer’s governing body.
While no specific new projects were announced, Lionsgate hints that there might be both licensed and original work as a result. “The investment will continue the extension of Lionsgate's film and television brands into the game space and will bring Lionsgate's expertise in creating and marketing premium content to Telltale's unique narrative-driven, storytelling approach to gaming,” the company says. “The collaboration will also enable the two companies to explore opportunities to co-develop existing and original IP into episodic games and television.”
[Source: Lionsgate]
Our Take
This move provides Telltale with additional resources, and links the developer to a partner that seems to taking a measured approach to gaming. Lionsgate teamed with Overkill for John Wick DLC in Payday 2. The company has also leveraged the popular Hunger Games films as a mobile game. I expect we’ll be hearing lots more from Lionsgate moving forward.
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