In the game industry, it's far from uncommon to see game studios bought and sold, finding new homes with bigger developers or broader holding companies, rather than continuing to work independently. Embracer Group is one holding company that's made several acquisitions, gathering studios of all kinds under one roof. Embracer Group, formerly known as THQ Nordic AB, has been expanding aggressively since the start of the 2010s, buying up major influences in the game industry, as well as other sectors of entertainment. It may not develop any games of its own, but as such a vast parent company, Embracer is still responsible for a lot of beloved game franchises.
Embracer Group was no slouch in 2021, acquiring some major names and indicating that it had no plans to slow its roll. Shortly after buying some major studios at the start of the year, Embracer made nearly a billion dollars of stocks available for puchase as a means of raising more funds. That was a clear sign that Embracer wanted to go big or go home this year, and the rest of its purchases in 2021 have driven that message home. If Embracer's impressive new catalogue of subsidiaries are anything to go off of, 2022 could be filled with even more major acquisitions.
Embracer Group's Early 2021 Acquisitions
The holding company started 2021 strong by announcing in February that it had bought Gearbox Entertainment, which means it now owns Gearbox Software of Borderlands fame. Considering the broad sucess of 2019's Borderlands 3 and the potential in Tiny Tina's Wonderlands, it's no surprise that Embracer wanted Gearbox.
Aside from the Borderlands creators, it also bought Easybrain and Aspyr Media in February 2021. Easybrain, which historically develops mobile games and apps, has become a new holding label within Embracer, while Aspyr Media will continue developing games and porting others to MacOS and iOS platforms as a subsidiary of Embracer's Saber Interactive.
Further Expansion in Mid-2021
Embracer picked up a few smaller studios in May 2021: Industry newcomers Appeal Studios, FRAME BREAK, and Massive Miniteam, as well as Kingdoms of Alamur: Re-Reckoning developer Kaiko Games. Scooping up these four studios was remarkable already, but Embracer topped itself by a wide margin when it acquired a long list of additional studios in August:
- 3D Realms
- Crazy Labs
- Demiurge Studios
- DigixArt
- Easy Trigger
- Force Field
- Fractured Byte
- Ghost Ship Games
- Grimfrost
- Slipgate Ironworks
- SmartPhone Labs
Embracer Group's End of Year Acquisitions
A few months passed without any further Embracer acquisitions, but in December 2021 it made statements about several studio pickups to seemingly round out a busy year. Aside from software developer Shiver Entertainment, Hungarian animation studio DIGIC, and German video-on-demand network Spotfilm Networx, Embracer bought Neverwinter developer Perfect World, as well as its subsidiary Cryptic Studios, of Star Trek Online fame. Both Perfect World and Cryptic Studios will be housed under Gearbox. Additionally, Embracer has placed a multi-billion euro bid on board game company Asmodee, known for publishing games such as Catan and Carcassonne.
Perhaps the most significant of these December acquisitions is Dark Horse Media, the parent company of Dark Horse Comics, which is well known for publishing the likes of Hellboy, Sin City, and Umbrella Academy, as well as a number of licensed comics. It wouldn't be surprising to see video game adaptations of Dark Horse IPs coming out in the near future with Embracer Group's broad resources.
Between the Gearbox acquisition at the start of 2021 and the Dark Horse purchase at the end, Embracer Group certainly found strongways to bookend the year. While its long-term plans with some of these purchases remain to be seen, it's clear that Embracer is eager to extend its influence and support as many creators as possible.