Universal Pictures closes its video game division

The bittersweet relationship between film and game producers adds a new victim.

Bad news for CBO Universal: the videogames division of the American movie giant closes. Some developers will be fired by the end of the year 2019 and others will be relocated within the company during the next months. One of those who must leave is Universal’s executive vice president of games and digital platforms, Chris Heatherly, who once emphasized the value of brands such as Jurassic Park, The Minions or Fast and Furious for the video game industry.

As the VentureBeat portal shares, it does not seem that the closure of the Universal video game branch has to do with any notable failure or economic problems of the division; the reason for the closure lies in setting the production company in priorities other than video games. The firm’s objective would be to transfer its licenses to third parties in the future. Heatherly’s adventure, therefore, ends after three years at Universal as her adventure ended in the Disney mobile games division.

In a company statement, Universal explains that “given the realities of the increasingly competitive nature of the mobile game landscape, Universal Brand Development is changing its investment and focus on games to opportunities that do not require self-publishing. This will allow to UBD deepen their licensing and association opportunities on all gaming platforms. ” His greatest success has been Jurassic World Evolution, which managed to overcome the barrier of the 2 million games sold with Frontier.

Source: VentureBeat

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BadSector is a seasoned journalist for more than twenty years. He communicates in English, Hungarian and French. He worked for several gaming magazines - including the Hungarian GameStar, where he worked 8 years as editor. (For our office address, email and phone number check out our impressum)

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