Embracer Plans Return of Dormant Game Franchises Including Deus Ex, Legacy of Kain and More

You will stay with Embracer Group for now, and there has been some other interesting news concerning them, particularly regarding one of the key strategic moves they are planning to make, which definitely makes their approach quite unique compared to other companies in the industry: the revival of their underperforming and discontinued franchises.

It is possible to find references to that on slide number 39 in their slide deck, which focuses on IP management. It is not even a hint at something they might do in the future. The very end of that section states that this particular strategy is an attempt to "leverage our underleveraged brand equity." In other words, they have a treasure trove of franchises that they believe can still pay off.

And when you look at their checklist, well, they've got quite an interesting bunch of names for you to see on it as well.

They've got Deus Ex, Saints Row, TimeSplitters, Thief, Red Faction, Legacy of Kain, and more, all combined. You're looking at that list and realizing that these are all video game franchises that can indeed be utilized for something else. The fact of the matter is, you've seen the recent trend in the industry of using video game IPs in creating films or television series.

This can easily give you an idea of how Embracer Group was able to think along those lines as well. However, on the other hand, when you really consider what their fans would like to see, it's quite obvious that these titles belong in gaming again. And, finally, Deus Ex is something that immediately comes to mind. This is a franchise that gets mentioned pretty much each time this topic comes up in any form.

You've probably seen polls, discussions, and comments regarding their willingness for more narrative, because fans just cannot seem to have enough of it. This is the franchise that has been keeping its place among those games for far too long for anyone to consider not playing it anymore. Saints Row, in turn, should require no additional information. We can safely say that its last title did not get good feedback.

There were plenty of disappointments and a few critics pointing out how bad the game really was. So, it's quite reasonable for people to wonder where exactly this franchise will be headed from now on. Another one of those games that has some background with them is TimeSplitters. It’s because they have tried reviving this game once before, but that was not a success in their attempt.

In any case, this is another example of a scenario in which an entirely new take will be needed on how to revive this franchise.

Red Faction, on the other hand, may very well become a dark horse for you, considering all the possibilities that this franchise has in it. Especially if we consider the capabilities of the PlayStation 2 and the later Xbox 360 versions of Red Faction, it did indeed offer an interesting experience to players at the time. All you would need to do here is to compare the possibilities of the engine with what is available to developers currently, and the idea becomes rather obvious.

In fact, even games such as Thief and Legacy of Kain might be suitable for this kind of approach, provided that they are managed properly. In general, one should not think that these franchises require a complete re-invention at an AAA-level in order to remain relevant. Sometimes, a smaller return can also be useful to these titles if properly approached.

Still, none of these games is ever expected to be released anytime soon. One needs to understand that in the case of most of these projects, it will take at least three or four years before any game gets officially released. In fact, these games are most likely considered from the point of view of future hardware possibilities.

This is when the discussion comes back around to Embracer Group, considering their operational practices remain a source of uncertainty.

If you take a look at the recent history of Embracer, you’ll notice the company has seen a lot of changes in the form of structural reorganizations, cancellations, and dropped projects. And now, hearing that they have announced they will 'activate' a vault of IPs raises some doubts regarding their capability of executing these plans successfully.

It gets you thinking about what it was that they did all this time, and the only reasonable conclusion would be poor management and lots of canceled projects, followed by lackluster releases such as the most recent Saints Row. There is certainly going to be some healthy skepticism when considering the idea, but on the other hand, the bar is not really set too high.

This is because right now, you are dealing with a scenario in which getting even reasonable results from some of these brands would still be considered success compared to what was going on before. The thing is that if Embracer manages to actually stabilize the business and start making proper progress with these ventures, the old names could finally come out of the vault and mean something more than a mention in slideshows.