As a bridge back into the gaming industry, Disney is reportedly looking to acquire a big-scale game publisher on par with EA to get back into the medium.
A new report released by Bloomberg details Disney might be getting back into the video game business. Current CEO, Bob Iger was set to retire, then extended his contract with Disney through 2026 to help right the ship through the company’s latest woes, including the massive wave of layoffs in April 2023. CEO Iger announced the plan to downsize as early as November 2022, and now the company is reportedly looking to make a gigantic splash in the video game publishing space.
In the report, executives have entertained the idea that CEO Bob Iger could move from licensing their titles to publishing them by acquiring a large game publisher. While the report specifically mentions Electronic Arts (EA), Bob Iger has used the term “noncommittal” to describe the prospect of any acquisition. The plans for an EA acquisition have already been discussed at length last year. NBCUniversal, Apple and even Amazon have been discussed as potential suitors, but nothing has actually come of it.
Disney has been a wild card when it comes to gaming, jumping into many different mediums over the past ten years to chase after booming fads. Disney Infinity was the toys-to-life response to the meteoric popularity of the Skylanders franchise, they then dove into rhythm games after the huge rise in popularity after Microsoft’s Kinect released Dance Central with Fantasia: Music Evolved (also published by Harmonix), and today there is even a popular TCG called Disney Lorcana for fans to play and collect.
While all of the reports of a potential purchase by Disney in the gaming sphere have not been confirmed, fans should take everything with a sense of caution, as nothing concrete has been announced just yet regarding a Disney video game publisher just yet.
