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Jet1337
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You must be new to the gaming industry:p

 

Look what happened with the Mass Effect series when EA took control as 'just a publisher'. A developer can have the most amazing vision for a game but the publisher has final say.

 

I don't know the specifics of the contract between Activision and Bungie and I can only hope Activision doesn't have that much involvement but after seeing what publishers are doing to the industry as a whole, i'm being cautious.

 

Fortunately that is not the same case here. EA flat-out bought and owns Bioware and the Mass Effect series whereas Bungie is merely partnered with Activision through a contract. In addition to that, unlike many IPs where the publisher owns the rights to the entire series (so say if MS publishes a game, it's impossible for the developer to release the same game on the PS3. Very rare exceptions such as Mass Effect 1 can be made, but this is the reason ME1 wasn't released on the PS3 until just recently. It took a deal of negotiating between MS and EA) Bungie has retained 100% of the series rights. Should Bungie and Activision ever agree to breaking the contract, Bungie is allowed to walk away and still own the entire franchise. This is, of course, assuming Activision would just let Bungie wall away. Activisions only role in this series is funding the initial development and thus getting a percentage of the return profit. Upon breaking contract, if Activision didn't sue like they're known to do, Bungie would merely have to payback the funding provided to them.

 

A similar situation occurred a few years ago with Brutal Legend's development. Double Fine retained all rights, but when Activision cancelled funding of the project, Tim Schafer took the game to EA to get publisher funding again. Activision didn't like this and ended up suing because of the money they'd invested in the series (which ultimately Double Fine ended up winning because Activision had decided to "cut losses" when they cancelled the game and therefore was no longer entitled to the money they had invested.

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