Another big company has bought up a game development studio, but this time, it wasn’t PlayStation, Xbox, or one of the usual suspects doing the buying. Atari announced this week the acquisition of Digital Eclipse, a developer known for its throwbacks and old-school games meant to mirror classic games. The studio has also worked on reimagined versions of older games that have been rereleased on current platforms with modernizations that make them more accessible and, in many cases, more enjoyable, so considering the nostalgia Atari is steeped in, it seems like an acquisition that makes a lot of sense.
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The acquisition is one of several that Atari has been part of over the past couple of months with the retro gaming company having a bit of a resurgence now with new game releases, collections, and consoles released this year.
Atari Buys Digital Eclipse
Buying Digital Eclipse will allow Atari to “expand its internal development capabilities” and use the developer’s tech it’s implemented in past rereleases. For context, Digital Eclipse was the developer that made Atari 50: The Anniversary Collection, the collection that came with tons of different retro games in one big bundle. Other games the studio worked on in the past include Space Jam: A New Legacy – The Game, Blizzard Arcade collection, Medievil, Disney Classic Games Collection, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Cowabunga Collection.
“Atari and Digital Eclipse share the same ethos when it comes to celebration and preservation of gaming history,” said Atari CEO Andrew Ayre. “It’s an exciting combination, and I am confident this will serve Digital Eclipse and our fans extremely well as we grow our business and expand our capabilities.”
Interestingly enough, it seems as though Digital Eclipse will still be able to pursue non-Atari projects if it chooses to do so. An FAQ shared on the studio’s site addressed questions about exclusivity, upcoming projects from Digital Eclipse that were already announced, and more.
“It is business as usual at Digital Eclipse! While we’re certainly happy to have greater access to Atari’s fantastic library, we still have the freedom to seek out projects with other parties,” an FAQ shared on the Digital Eclipse site said. “In addition to recent releases like Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord and The Making of Karateka, Digital Eclipse has a lot of unannounced projects in the works that do not involve Atari’s IP, and those will carry on as planned. The future is wide open, and we believe partnering with Atari will bring about even more opportunities.”
Some of Atari’s other acquisitions in the past few months include buying the rights to the Awesomenauts and Swords & Soldiers games from Romino Games. Continuing the trend of buying up studios that work on classic games or remakes, one of the more prominent Atari acquisitions this year was the news that the company had purchased the System Shock developer Nightdive Studios.
