Activision CEO Explains Why Ghostbusters and 50 Cent Were Dropped

Following the merger between Activision and Vivendi to form Activision Blizzard, it was announced that a number of games — including high profile titles like Ghostbusters and Brutal Legend — were being dropped. Disappointing as it was, it was a mind-boggling decision to many gamers, given that Activision decided to retain the rights to other Vivendi franchises like Crash Bandicoot and Spyro the Dragon. We’ve theorized that this was simply a matter of being able to milk those franchises more than you could the new Riddick, and sure enough, Activision CEO Bobby Kotick admitted as much during yesterday’s Activision Blizzard earnings call.

According to MTV Multiplayer, while answering a question on why some of Vivendi’s games were dropped, Kotick laid out the reality of the matter — albeit without referring to any specific games:

“[Those games] don’t have the potential to be exploited every year on every platform with clear sequel potential and have the potential to become $100 million dollar franchises. … I think, generally, our strategy has been to focus… on the products that have those attributes and characteristics, the products that we know [that] if we release them today, we’ll be working on them 10 years from now.”

It’s a fair point given that Activision is, after all, a business, but it’s easy to be upset with that sort of strategy. Luckily, Kotick did say original properties are important, but they need to be careful with which properties they pursue. Of the 15 properties Activision Blizzard is planning to release next year, “three, maybe four” of those will be “exciting new intellectual properties.”Too bad none of them will be Ghostbusters or Brutal Legend.