Activision Suing EA? (Yahoo! 13/2/09) (Right No More Yahoo After This)

Last year when Vivendi Games merged with Activision, a number of titles in the Vivendi catalog fell by the wayside, though were fortunately picked up by other publishers later. Ghostbusters, The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Athena and Brutal Legend were all part of this group. Brutal Legend, Double Fine's action title based around a heavy metal character (voiced by Jack Black), was picked up by EA. It seems that Activision Blizzard isn't all too happy about this.

Variety is reporting that although Activision Blizzard doesn't want to publish the title (it doesn't think returns will be enough to bother, it seems), the publisher is claiming that it still has the rights to do so, despite the fact that it never intends to release it. Meanwhile, Double Fine says that it owns the IP and as Activision Blizzard decided not to publish the title following the merger, it had the right to shop it to whomever it wanted, which is where EA stepped in.

So now, Activision Blizzard has written a letter to Electronic Arts to say that it still has the rights to publish the title. The assumption is that Activision Blizzard wants a little moolah to make the "transaction" legit, though the studio isn't expanding upon these details.

We just want to play the game.