Disney May Accidentally Buy Ignition Entertainment

Things have not been going swimmingly at Ignition Entertainment of late. Since Indian entertainment conglomerate UTV's purchase of the UK publisher, Ignition has gone on to lay off hundreds of staffers and close down nearly all of its internal development teams, with the expressed purpose of solely focusing on publishing games developed by external studios.

Now that whole plan may be tossed asunder, as news comes (courtesy of Develop) that Disney has put in a bid for UTV. Disney is already the largest shareholder in UTV's various media operations, with a 50.4% stake in the company. Now, it's looking to pony up the $454 million necessary to simply own the company outright.

Disney's primary interest in UTV is, well, pretty much everything except its gaming division. UTV is extremely successful in India's film and television market, and is clearly interested in breaking off a bigger piece of that Bollywood action.

This marriage of convenience between two major media powers seemingly leaves Ignition as the unfortunate stepchild of a new daddy that previously stood accused of killing its own video gaming children. Disney has been making its own moves to excise "core gaming" studios like Black Rock and Propaganda in recent months, shifting its focus toward social/casual games, which puts Ignition in a rather deadly position. So it really is pretty much just the plot of The Stepfather. Either the 1986 or 2009 version. Your pick.

Coming on the heels of the news regarding the delay of Ignition's sole upcoming major console release, El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron, into August, this all does seem to put a bit of a dark cloud over both Ignition's future, and any potential push El Shaddai may have been set to receive. Given that game's Biblical (albeit non-canonical) leanings, if possible, Ignition may want to just get that game out on store shelves as soon as humanly possible. Disney does not have a particularly great track record of releasing products under its various media labels that garner even a hint of controversy.

Hmm, should be interesting to see how this plays out.

It's always a shame to hear about studios being shut down, or in danger of being shut down. Good luck to them. Here's hoping they don't end up making iOS'ware in the near future.

To be fair, Alex, Disney was doing us a favor in trying to bury ICP.

I wonder what Shane thinks of this.

@wh4tshisface said:

I wonder what Shane thinks of this.

Some dude asked him about it on Twitter an hour or so ago. His reply was "no comment. #gonefishing". Read that as you will.

@wh4tshisface said:

I wonder what Shane thinks of this.

Some dude asked him about it on Twitter an hour or so ago. His reply was "no comment. #gonefishing". Read that as you will.

No!

@iAmJohn said:

@wh4tshisface said:

I wonder what Shane thinks of this.

Some dude asked him about it on Twitter an hour or so ago. His reply was "no comment. #gonefishing". Read that as you will.

I hope all ends well for him 

@wh4tshisface said:

I wonder what Shane thinks of this.

Some dude asked him about it on Twitter an hour or so ago. His reply was "no comment. #gonefishing". Read that as you will.

I really enjoyed the demo of this. I hope this doesn't stop the release.

I know I'm not going to buy El Shaddai, and hearing that they might get shut down saddens me.

Since Ignition published Deadly Premonition, does this mean theres a chance Agent York will be in the next Kingdom Hearts?

This is some of the most bummer news in quite a while. A bunch of great people lost their jobs for sure, and I really thought Ignition was starting to go places and stand on their own as a development house!

@RobotHamster: no, more likely the next Kingdom Hearts has Mickey perform a 20 minute Bollywood routine (Kinect optional).

I definitely agree with the last paragraph. Get out El Shaddai while you can. The Disney brass do not want to be associated with apocryphal religious combat.

Goodbye Ignition Entertainment. 

I'm a tester at Disney Interactive and here's my response:

*ahem*

"OH GOD PLEASE DON'T SHUT THEM DOWN WE NEED BETTER GAMES TO WORK ON"

... that is all.

The Sweet Life of York and Zach coming to Disney Channel this Fall!!

My coffee tells me that Ignition will be closed down by the end of the year.

If Ignition is shut down then Giant Bomb should hire Shane

@theanticitizen said:

If Ignition is shut down then Giant Bomb should hire Shane

This.

Also man it would suck if Disney bought UTV. Ignition is a really cool company. Shane has been doing alot of good work there. I mean they brought Deadly Premonition to the US!

@iAmJohn said:

@wh4tshisface said:

I wonder what Shane thinks of this.

Some dude asked him about it on Twitter an hour or so ago. His reply was "no comment. #gonefishing". Read that as you will.

Ah geez.

Not good. Disney will probably just shut them down :/

My educated guess is that El Shaddai will come out. They already have a business plan in place for the release, all the funds allocated and a bunch of other stuff. Whatever Disney's plans are for UTV or Ignition, it'd be pretty pointless to immediately send everybody packing right away halfway through a fiscal year, which would only make their deal less profitable. More likely they'll finish the game, publish it as expected THEN decide what to do with Ignition.

Whiskey should hire Jeff Green and Shane Bettenhausen on as part of its continuing series of integrating the best parts of old 1UP into Giant Bomb.

Hopefully Disney will let them buy themselves out and go independent. Or sell Ignition to someone else - Warner Bros. or something. El Shaddai looks really cool, and the demo was actually  really fun. I've been watching it ever since Shane Bettenhausen came to GiantBomb for the Quick Look EX of that game. It would be a shame if that was pretty much Ignition's only game. Maybe that Japanese Ignition studio could find a home with Konami or Sega or something. 
 
Either way, I'm sure Disney won't do the right thing here since they're intent on destroying their once-promising video game division. If Black Rock and Propaganda got shut down, and Junction Point suffered major layoffs, there's no way Disney will hold onto the El Shaddai studio. *sigh*

Great, so Disney can acquire yet another studio and then misuse them then dissolve the studio like they did with the Split/Second guys.  Good job Disney!

It's a sad time to work in Disney's core games division :(

I can't see why everyone is getting all flummoxed over this Disney deal.  As Alex pointed out in the first paragraph, UTV has already neutered Ignition when they turned it into a publishing-only company.  That's what Disney Interactive does these days already, so it wouldn't surprise me if they did dump Ignition.  Will they sell them off to another company or exploit their Japanese contacts for more Disney licensing remains to be seen.  Chances are someone like Atlus will have to pick up the slack when they leave.

It's a sad time to work in Disney's core games division :(

It was nice knowing you, Ignition.

Since Ignition published Deadly Premonition, does this mean theres a chance Agent York will be in the next Kingdom Hearts?

So this guarantees me picking up a copy of Deadly Premonition and El Shaddei for the sole fear of the print runs coming to an end.

It's not nice to hear a studio go under

I blame John Vignocchi.

Sad that Disney needs to shut these guys down, instead of sell them off.  I really dont care about facebook advertising scheme games.

Doesn't sound good for Ignition but I hope no one loses their job.