Sega set to buy Angry Birds publisher Rovio
thesixthaxis.comThe Wall Street Journal are reporting that Sega Sammy are set to close a deal and purchase Angry Birds creator Rovio. An Israeli investor, Playtika, was in talks to by Rovio for $800m early this year but talks ended without any formal offer.
While Angry Birds is still popular with new games in the franchise launched fairly regularly, Rovio have not managed to create any other big hits. Titles such as Sugar Blast, Small Town Murders and Darkfire Heroes have not been massive hits. There have been Angry Birds games on consoles but again, not big hits.
The most recent was Angry Birds VR: The Isle Of Pigs which we scored 8/10 in our review. “Angry Birds VR: Isle of Pigs is a lot of fun. It works exactly as you’d hope in VR, and the game world is pretty to look at even as you’re toppling the horribly capitalist pigs and their snotty structures,” said Jason.
Angry Birds is still making money for Rovio so it’s a decent investment for Sega and it will give them a mobile arm, they are one of the few big name publishers without one at present. Activision have King, Take-Two have Zynga, and Tencent have Supercell, while Sony, Ubisoft and others develop mobile games in house.
Source: WSJ
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