Sega Sports Is Dead
Take-Two grabs Visual Concepts for $24 million.
By Christian Nutt
Earlier, we reported that publishing giant Take-Two had signed a deal with Major League Baseball for exclusive rights to make baseball games with the real names of players and official teams. According to San Francisco Business Times, the second phase of the company's wheeling and dealing has fallen into place. After buying out Microsoft's sports concerns late last year, the company has moved on to purchase Visual Concepts--Sega's development arm for their line of sports games.
Last year's ESPN 2K5, a mainstay for Visual Concepts and a direct competitor for Electronic Arts' Madden series, was co-published by Sega and GlobalStar, a Take-Two games brand, at a budget price. Part of the publishing agreement was reputed to give Take-Two the option to purchase Visual Concepts from Sega, and now the company has apparently exercised that option for a cool $24 million.
According to an anonymous source at Visual Concepts, the developer is poised to take advantage of Take-Two's 7-year exclusive MLB license. This monumental deal comes as Sega moves focus away from publishing sports titles in the U.S. (presumably to concentrate on its key core gamer franchises) and Take-Two looking to capitalize on the lucrative Sports gaming market by grabbing a slice of EA dominance.
A Sega representative was unavailable for comment as of press time.
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