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Buena Vista Games To Aqquire Climax Racing on September 28, 2006.
Addition of UK Studio Furthers Buena Vista Games’ Commitment to Quality and
Creativity
Buena Vista Games, Inc.
(BVG), the interactive entertainment affiliate of The Walt Disney Company (NYSE:
DIS), today announced the acquisition of the award-winning Climax Racing from
Climax Group Ltd. The studio is of both strategic and geographic importance to
BVG as it becomes the third internal studio, and the first in Europe, that BVG
has added to its development capacity. BVG currently operates development
studios in Vancouver, British Columbia (Propaganda Games), and Salt Lake City,
Utah (Avalanche Software). The addition of Climax Racing allows BVG to create
triple-A racing titles that meet the highest standards for creativity and
quality. Terms of the deal are not being disclosed. The deal is expected to
close in early October.
“The acquisition of Climax Racing aligns perfectly with our strategic and
geographic goals by allowing us to both reach into new genres and new markets
for creative talent,” said Graham Hopper, senior vice president and general
manager, Buena Vista Games. “Adding Climax Racing to our creative family will
provide an additional catalyst for our continued growth in the video games
market.”
“As a premier, award-winning studio that has created some of the best racing
titles of all time, Climax Racing is an ideal component of BVG’s expanding
portfolio of development talent,” said Karl Jeffery, founder and chief executive
officer of Climax.
Climax Racing is known as a leading developer of racing games, including its
critically-acclaimed work on the best-selling franchises “MotoGP” and “ATV
Offroad(R) Fury.” The studio and its products have won or been nominated for
dozens of awards, including winning four IGN “Best of Show” awards at E3 2006.
Tony Beckwith, co-founder of the studio, has been named vice president and
general manager of Climax Racing as it continues its creative direction under
BVG. Climax Racing is based in Brighton, England, and employs more than 100
talented video game artists, programmers and designers.
“The Walt Disney Company holds one of the largest and most exciting portfolios
of intellectual property in the world, and through BVG, we look forward to
having access to the company’s deep resources in the video games space to
continue creating remarkable interactive entertainment,” said Beckwith. “This
promises to be a mutually beneficial relationship and we believe that together
we will make outstanding games for the next generation and beyond.”
About Climax Racing
Climax Racing was established in early 2000, with the goal of becoming the
industry's premier vehicle game development house. With carefully managed and
rapid growth, it has evolved into a three team studio employing over one hundred
people, working for some of the largest publishers in the business on current
and next-generation consoles. Using its proprietary render engine and DYNE
physics libraries the studio has become experienced at producing triple-A,
critically acclaimed titles in very competitive development times.
About Buena Vista Games
Buena Vista Games, Inc. (BVG) is the interactive entertainment affiliate of The
Walt Disney Company. BVG develops, publishes, markets and distributes a broad
portfolio of multi-platform video games and interactive entertainment worldwide.
The company also licenses properties and works directly with third-party
interactive game publishers to bring products for all ages to market. For more
information, please log on to www.bvg.com.
About Climax
Founded in 1988 by Karl Jeffery, Climax has grown to become the world's leading
independent video game developer. At the cutting edge of the games industry,
Climax develops technologically advanced and critically acclaimed interactive
games software for all major console platforms. The company works with major
worldwide publishers such as Microsoft, SCEA, Buena Vista Games and THQ to
create such hit titles as “ATV Offroad Fury 3,” “Sudeki” and the “MotoGP” series
on Xbox, Xbox 360 and PC.
Climax is headquartered in Portsmouth, England. Additional information on
Climax is available at www.climaxgroup.com.
Source: Disney
Reported by Joseph Bennett. |
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