jarrod said:
ElGranCabeza said:
jarrod said:
ElGranCabeza said:
jarrod said:
ElGranCabeza said:
jarrod said:
ElGranCabeza said:
jarrod said:
ElGranCabeza said:
jarrod said:
Ninpanda said:
From these five, only Atlus and Level-5 are somewhat plausible, but I still strongly doubt, that they'll "acquire" either of these companies.
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Atlus is already owned by someone, and Level-5 would never sell out. Hell, the way they're going, Level-5's more likely to buy out SCE in the future. ;)
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Let's not be ridiculous here.
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Sony selling SCE off to Level-5 isn't any more ridiculous than Level-5 selling out to Sony. It'll only happen over Hino's dead body...
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It is way more ridiculous actually, and you know it.
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It really isn't tbh. The very idea that Sony could even buy L-5 is so outside the realm of reality, that anyone really thinking that's possible must know next to nothing about any of the companies involved.
And the whole thread is ridiculous, it has been since that batshit insane OP/poll. Talk about devs like Sucker Punch, United Front or thatgamecompany, not well established JP publishers who have been in videogames longer than Sony themselves.
Sony's NEVER bought out a JP developer actually...
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It really is. Sony has the means and assets to acquire L5 if it really wanted to, L5 does not have the funds to acquire SCEWWS unless they get major loans from major banks. SCEWWS is, without a doubt, worth more than L5. Of course neither scenario is likely to happen but your suggestion that L5 could buy SCEWWS is more ridiculous than the other suggested scenario by the OP.
And yes, it's true that Sony never bought a JP developer, hence why I said SCEJ doesn't get it as they either need to acquire one or developer more JP centric games for the JP audience. They don't seem to care though as the FW fiasco that was reported shows, SCEJ is just crap outside of Ueda and Yamauchi's teams.
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This isn't about means and assets. Microsoft actually tried to acquire Nintendo, and they certainly had the means to do so... L5 is 100% private and Hino is dedicated to being 100% independent. When we're already outside reality, I don't see much point in measuring. You said "let's not be ridiculous here", I said we're already too late. Sony buying out Capcom or L5 or SE? Ridiculous.
And if you want to get into it, I said "the way things are going". As in, L-5 is the fastest growing major publisher in Japan, and just opened an American branch, while SCEWWS has basically been in the dumps all gen sales wise. Who knows where it'll end, on both sides...
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Oh I know Hino wants to stay independent, but if Sony (or MS or Nintendo for that matter) offered him 1 trillion yen for L5 and he didn't take it, he'd be borderline stupid as that is way over the value of what his company is probably currently worth. But then again maybe he's like Zuckerberg and knows something we don't know like when Zuckerberg turned down MS offer for U$4 billion for his shares on facebook.
And I know the TS was ridiculous with his options, especially with the options for SCE to "buy" Konami, Capcom or SE. As I said in my original post, SP, RaD, QD, ClapHanz and such are much more likely candidates.
BTW, MS never tried to buy Nintendo, they said they were actually considering it. Big difference. They tried to buy Yahoo and facebook, but they never even got that close with Nintendo.
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Hino cares about more than money. The reason he and his colleagues founded Level-5 was to make the games they wanted... that's not exactly "borderline stupid" imo.
L5 is also probably pretty valuable at this point... they have two full teams (the original in Fukuoka, and a new studio in Tokyo) with a staff of over 250 at this point, they have multiple million selling IPs (Professor Layton, Inazuma Eleven and soon Ninokuni), a lucrative Dragon Quest contract (which would get flushed if they were Sony owned), a new US office, and even their mocap studio. Even SSCEWWS doesn't have a mocap studio afaik.
Also, Microsoft actually made a $25B offer for Nintendo. Yamauchi flatly turned it down.
And not only has Sony never bought another Japanese studio, Microsoft actually hasn't either. Weirdly, not only has Nintendo bought out other Japanese developers before, they even bought out a Japanese publisher once (HAL).
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IOh it would be borderline stupid because they could take the money and open up another studio to make the games they want to make, how they want to make. L5 has grown to be huge, but not 1 trillion yen huge like I suggested. I'm well aware of how big they have gotten over the past few years, and they are also running into something only big devs run into: Franchise milking and fatigue as shown by the latest IE sales. And actually we don't know who's making DQX Wii, rumors has it that it's another developer that's 2nd party to Nintendo (name skips me right now). And I think ND has a mocap studio available to them, not 100% sure though.
Do you have a link for the MS bid for Nintendo?
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But, they want to make Professor Layton, Inazuma Eleven and Ninokuni. They've already built up brand equity, both in their company and in their games, they have amazing relationships with Nintendo and Sqaure Enix, they have a state of the art HQ, a brand new US office... sometimes "cashing out" doesn't make sense, especially when you're growing as fast as a company like Level-5.
I do agree they're hitting some franchise fatigue with BOTH Layton and Inazuma at home (annual sequels will do that), but they're bringing in more new IPs like Ninokuni, Little Battlers and Fantasy Life, which will probably help offset that. Layton's also big as ever outside Japan (thanks to Nintendo), and there's no doubt Inazuma will be equally huge when it hits Europe.
And as for Microsoft offering $25B for Nintendo, it's in Dean Takahashi's book "Opening the Xbox". Here's a web reference to it.
edit: also, looking at Uncharted 1-2's credits, ND had to use a contracted studio for mocap (House of Moves). So nope, they don't have their own.
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