Mario & Luigi's Future In Doubt As A Potential Sony Acquisition Emerges

Acquire aren’t even the original team so why the fate of Mario+Luigi going forward would be in question is beyond me. It’s already shifted to a new developer once so there’s nothing stopping them finding a new studio should it come to it

what will nintendo ever do?
it's over guys.
it's OVER

Sony owning Kadokawa would probably be a bad thing for a lot of japanese pop media, since Kadokawa is a large face in the akihabara subculture, even if a lot of people don't know they exist.

There's always that looming fear of anime adaptations being diluted in the future, or forcing censorships in anime beyond what is allowed on TV. Or just playing things overly safe like what Sony has been doing with the Madoka Magica series, giving lots of sequels even after the original series ended properly

The console market is so anti-consumer with it's "exclusives'. There's honestly no reason to buy consoles without that, unless you want something on the go like a Switch or Steam Deck - which are a little more mobile than laptops.

What did carry over from the original M&L formulation to the latest game, would not at all be beyond another studio to replicate or even enhance. Perhaps moving over the tools to make a new game to another studio may mean it’ll take longer for the next game, but it’ll doubtless remain an active series within Nintendo.

I'm a million times more concerned about stuff like AI: The Somnium Files and Danganronpa in this scenario honestly. Would have to imagine those series would go on to basically only exist in the form of, like, a Monokuma Astro Bot skin or something.

I kind of want Sony to just go away now, they're actually making gaming a bit more difficult.
Still waiting for FF7R2 to appear on another console/PC

really hope so, haven't played a game like MLB that's as soulless, grindy and with horrible graphics in forever.

@DarkFighter You should play more games then

@eltomo I agree, Xbox and Playstation have zero raison detre. They're just sub-par PCs which lure people in with anti-consumer exclusives. At least the handholds have a USP.

I don't like Sony and don't really care for anything they do gaming related, but this would make me like Sony even less.

I'm pretty sure Sony had lay-offs at some point this year, but they can afford buying game studios? JUST GIVE MARIO AND LUIGI A BREAK

If Brothership doesn't sell well then Nintendo might not see a point in continuing the franchise especially if this goes through. That would mean they'd have to find a whole new team, and it simply might not be worth it to them.

I honestly had no idea Kodakawa owned all those game companies. Or any game companies. I just thought like, romance manga…? Sucks though, SpikeChunsoft makes some pretty good games, it’d be a shame to lose them on Nintendo consoles…

If Sony is stupid enough to throw away the money Spike Chunsoft games makes on Nintendo consoles, that's their problem.

There's plenty of others than Nintendo can make games with.

How about no more massive corporate consolidations?

@Dazman Using that logic the Switch is a sub-par tablet that lures people in with anti-consumer exclusives.

@PikminMarioKirby That would be sad after such a revival year for the Mario RPG genre. 3 in under a year!

Surely this can't be even be possible. I remember reading that in the 2000s Nintendo was blocked from acquiring Bandai (before the Namco merge) under anti-monopoly laws.

How could Sony be allowed to buy a company that big?

@MrPeanutbutterz Yeah, pretty much. If there weren't exclusives only poor people would choose it over something like the Steam Deck and not through choice.

I don't really think there's anything really to worry about here, at least in regards to the prospect of PS exclusivity. Kadokawa are quite a multimedia company, having fingers in many pies. Sony have also demonstrated with the Bungie acquisition that they aren't above owning gaming studios which aren't part of the PlayStation Studios family. It would be in Sony's best interests to allow Kadokawa's gaming entities to exist as is, much of their output is specifically Japan focused, and sells better on Nintendo. Let's not forget they've been getting into shipping games on PC and even Switch.

Unless proven otherwise, I would imagine Kadokawa will largely operate independently, much like Bungie were supposed to do until they started losing massive amounts of cash.

Kadokawa is a very important Japanese company. If Sony will buy them... RIP Japanese media.

I mean, if Brothership does well I’m sure they’ll arrange something with them or find a new developer. And if Brothership doesn’t do well, well then they probably weren’t going to make another with these devs anyway.

I guess the only way this could result in the series being cancelled that wouldn’t have had that happen anyway is if Brothership has a middling performance and finding a new dev is not worth the time. But even then, there are a lot of for hire studios out there that would jump at the chance to work on a Nintendo franchise like this. I don’t think they’d have trouble.

The genre isnt in trouble, Nintendo will find another.

@mariomaster96 I've literally completed 60+ games on Switch alone, not counting the previous generations. the game is bland and empty

This is getting ridiculous. It feels like every other day, the big gaming companies or their parent companies are constantly in talks of buying basically everything despite the fact that they can't sustain themselves doing so (Microsoft shutting down multiple studios following the ludicrous Activision-Blizzard buyout comes to mind) so really in the long-run the only people that benefit from these buyouts are the out-of-touch CEOs and shareholders that don't actually care for any of the games these companies produce and only are invested in the short-term gain of money.

Terrible new's. I have zero faith in Sony these day's and this would probably spell end to Shiren and other nieche series.

I thought my day couldn't get anymore terrible

Sony owns Crunchyroll and Funimation. Now it's hungry for Kadokawa. It would be horrible.

But it wouldn't kill Mario & Luigi RPG. We thought it would die when the original dev team went kaputz but Nintendo revived it. The same would happen, if there was desire enough from fans.

Spike Chunsoft's loss to Sony would further consolidate Square-Enix and their franchises onto PlayStation, because not only are they key for Octopath, but more importantly, they're key collaborators with Enix on Dragon Quest. That's the franchise that allowed Enix to buy Squaresoft. They're also developers of the Mystery Dungeon franchise, so Pokémon Mystery Dungeon would be an issue (but expect more Torneko & Chocobo Mystery Dungeons, perhaps, instead).

I believe it will reach a point where actions like this would already be considered monopolizing and companies can file legal action.

As for the companies being acquired, they would need to consider if being boxed in to just one system is to their best interest. Let's be honest, Sony isn't exactly the biggest in the gaming industry right now, no matter how loudly the purists howl.

Who cares about that, the real issue is that Sony would have From Software, meaning any future Dark Souls/Elden Ring/Sekiro games could all be exclusives from now on. We already saw how bad that with what happened to Bloodborne (they still refuse to remaster/port it, even though Miyazaki is up for it).

Hold up...how would this cast doubt? Alpha Dream was straight up shut down and Nintendo just moved the series to a new developer. They could even decide to develop a new M&L game in-house if they wanted to.
How does this cast doubt?

I'm really sick of Sony and Microsoft trying to buy every studio. The worst part is it's not even working for them. The studios end up shutting down and gamers take the hit in the long run.

Even if the acquisition went through, Sony like Microsoft will also had to face the FTC first before they would be able to bargain on an acquisition that big. The FTC didn't go after them when they acquired Bungie cause Bungie was a smaller entity.

Acquiring not just the studios but the actual parent company of said studios is a dangerous gamble as it could lead to multiple layoffs and potential job loss from staff of both the acquisition partner and Sony Interactive Entertainment. I don't see this acquisition doing so well if somehow the talking actually works out. In any case RIP to some of these studios soon, Sony are known for closing their own studios without any rhymes or reasons so here's hoping Kadokawa see the lights and don't take the bait.

It depends on which arm of The Sony Group is doing the purchasing.
Sony Music has historically done well with Nintendo collabs. They've published soundtracks for series like Zelda and Mother and have advertised things like the Switch port of Fate/Extella through Fate/Grand Order. Sony Pictures will be working with Nintendo and Arad Productions to distribute the upcoming live-action Zelda movie.

If it's Sony Interactive Entertainment (the division that owns the PlayStation brand), however, that's a wrap. Part of the reason why Nintendo pulled Smash out of the EVO fighting game tournament lineup was because of EVO being bought out by Sony Interactive.

''Should Sony acquire, um, Acquire''

I knew that line would show up somewhere in the article lol

@larryisaman Well seeing as the series director works at Acquire, the series would probably actually die. They’re the only reason Nintendo went with Acquire I’m pretty sure.

@NCChris The reason why Nintendo went with Acquire is because the series director and combat director for the original games worked there.

Very tired of these big Sony and Microsoft acquisitions, followed by studio rot and demise without fail, of course.

This was a ridiculously click-baity headline, and I don't care for it! 😝

@Dazman "Exclusives" are about 95% of new games that are actually worth playing. Nintendo and Sony have incentive to make system selling games. If you take consoles away and exclusives with them. You're going to see a whole lot more live service garbage.

The click-baitiest of click-bait titles that ever click-baited.

@MrPeanutbutterz It's not anti-consumer exclusives if Nintendo are the ones who made those games or actually own those IPs. Nintendo didn't buy franchise to make them exclusives, Nintendo made their own exclusives. When Nintendo bought Rare, they didn't make Battletoads or Jetpac exclusives to their platform, they had Rare made exclusives for them like Donkey Kong Country and Banjo-Kazooie, heck Nintendo even let Rare kept a lot of those exclusives with them when they got shift to Microsoft such as Killer Instinct, Conker, and Perfect Dark.

When Nintendo bought Monolith Soft, they didn't acquired IPs like Xenogears, Xenosaga, and Baten Kaitos, those IPs remained with their parent publisher. Instead Nintendo had them create an entirely new IP such as Monado: Beginning of the World series which we now known as the Xenoblade Chronicles franchise.

Okay, I've seen all the click bait versions of this story but this one ticks me off the most because it's just a bold faced lie. PlayStation could never buy Kadokawa themselves. Kadokawa is too freaking big. Sony could feasibly buy them, IF Japan's much stricter anti-monopoly laws allowed it, and in this scenario there would be no change whatsoever. Other departments of Sony have played nice with Nintendo in the past; other divisions of Sony have games currently in Switch. FATE is Sony Music's biggest earner and it's on Switch.

Kadokawa Games will not suddenly become locked to PlayStation if this does go through. Stop lieing

That would suck so much if that purchase actually happens.

@VoidofLight I really do not believe that was the sole deciding factor for them using Acquire.
Nintendo has plenty of JRPG Directors and Producers at their disposal, even without Acquire, they still have plenty to pick from.

If this is true then Sony is just as bad as Microsoft. Enough with the freaking acquisitions already.

I'm over the acquisitions.

@NCChris The series would literally not be the same if they chose anyone else outside of the original series director and combat director.

baiting of the click

Maybe, just maybe, if M&L:BS is not selling well, it's just not a good game and it's not so much lost if its developer is sold to Sony? Haven't played the game, though...

@Serpenterror A little note, Nintendo never technically bought Rare. They never hold majority shares of Rare back then.

In fact, one of the reasons why it was sold to Microsoft was because Rare needing more money and Nintendo not being open at first to purchase more of it, allowing other companies to make their bets.

Also, big aquisitions like this always leads to cost cutting and layoffs, it's not only Sony. I remember when people screamed at the FTC when they were saying that was going to happen with the Microsoft-Activision merger and how Microsoft said they totally wouldn't do it... only for them to do just that after the courts shrugged at the FTC complaining about market consolidation (again) and dismissed everything.

Last thing I want is for Sony to get Spike Chunsoft man....

Also, aside of the Mario thing and even Nintendo, this aquisition would be insane. Like, it should probably even get attention for regulators if it was proposed insane.

And, unlike a US company buying a Japanese one, this one is local so the protections and regulations are probably not as strong. Hoping this is just a rumour.

Yeah, I'm more worried about other series such as Shiren/Mystery Dungeon in general before I worry about M&L.

this would be huge for sony if it happens and it would make sense for them...

@Serpenterror trump ftc will not really care about anti trust...they will be less regulatory..

@Ultimapunch That's why I say it's anti-consumer as the exclusives force consumers to buy a worthless device which nobody would otherwise buy. Without those, manufacturers would actually have to focus on making devices with a USP if they wanted to take business away from the PC: which would be pro-consumer.

As for live service games, don't play them if you don't like them. I certainly don't.

After the *****!t that happened post merger with M$ and ActiBlizz, all these mergers and acquisitions, takeovers and buy-outs should be "illegal" as none of these companies will ever put out as many games as before hand. Or in any decent quality.
Not to mention the most important part: all the job losses!

I really hope this doesn't go through, hopefully rumors stay rumors. There's been constant talks about Japanese companies like Sega and Capcom being acquired but it seems that companies in the East tend to hold out from big buyouts. Spike Chunsoft has been a pretty good partner with Nintendo so that would be a massive blow. Furthermore, the buyout could probably eliminate future Dark Souls/FromSoftware titles from coming to Nintendo consoles.

@Lizuka I'd also like to see them bring the Zero Escape series over before they go getting gobbled up by Sony. I agree; definitely much more worried about them than M&L; tons of talented teams would love to take that series on. It'll land fine.

sony does not see nintendo as it's competition i can see times when a collaboration can continue..have we all forgot that sony is co -financing the zelda movie

I’m not really concerned for M&L's future (for now atleast) as much as I'm concerned for the possible reality of modern Sony owning one of the biggest (if not the biggest) anime/manga/light novels companies on earth.

The acquisition makes sense for both parties, sure, but I'm still more concerned of Sony’s plans and handling of the anime & manga side of it all then anything video game-related tbh.

@Dev1024 One millions of copies isn't that much for a Nintendo IP, they are definitely not bad numbers, but I could see Nintendo prioritizing other projects instead.

it is what it is. imo nintendo has been lazy over the years by not acquiring studios themselves

@Spider-Kev To be fair, it's not like Activision wouldn't have laid off those people anyways, like...that company was being run by the greediest and scummiest person in the planet. And the acquisition actually ended up backfiring on Xbox because Microsoft is now pushing them to become a third party.

@Dazman There many other consoles (EverCade, PlayDate, Nex Generation, etc.) that had exclusives that also didn't sell well. It's not just the exclusives that sell consoles, it's the clever marketing as well. Steam Deck had many great games especially on the Steam store alone, only problem is Valve doesn't want or know how to market the system to the general audience out there hence why many won't be able to buy the units.

Those who does want one had to jump through hoops to get one and those who does had one either had issue making their games work or just not enjoying it as much cause PC games aren't optimize the same as console games. You can make a console with tons of exclusives all you want but if nobody knows about it or doesn't get the message then they won't be able to buy your console no matter how innovative or unique your console is. Marketing is the key to success, having exclusives could help but that won't be enough if the marketing lack efforts.

The industry is changing and Sony will probably release more games than the Lego game on a Nintendo console.

This is why so many "long time" Sony exclusives came to Xbox too last year.

@johnedwin Sony pictures. Not Sony Playstation.

And sure Sony doesn't see Nintendo as competition, because they really aren't. Nintendo is outselling sony 3:1 this generation. And to think the Switch 2 will come next year...

@Poco_Lypso You had to realize acquiring other studios means you lose money, not gain. Even worst is that once you acquired another party, they came with similar positions adding to the ones you already have meaning you'll be paying more people for the same job than you would before. This is why when most big company acquired another partner that they layoff a few people from both sides cause they don't want to pay too much for the same position.

Not acquiring another studio doesn't means the company is lazy, it just means that studio doesn't had something they need or want yet. If Nintendo saw a need for a studio to add to their partner lineup for the good of the company then they will acquired them (like HAL Lab, Camelot, Monolith Soft, and Shiver Entertainment) but blindly throwing money in mass acquisition for the sake of acquiring just to monopolize IPs and impressed investors won't help the company grow in the long run.

Just look at Microsoft, they own almost every popular or beloved IPs (Crash, Spyro, Conker, Banjo, Sabrewulf, Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey, Pitfall, Viva Pinata, Jet Force Gemini, Minecraft, Blast Corp, Ori, Super Meat Boy, Cuphead, Kameo, etc.) under the sun but does that mean we get those games continuously on Xbox? Nope. Even worst is that after the mass acquisition many studios either got shutdown or many dev team members got layoff resulting in some beloved games turning to crap cause a lot of the more experience team members got let go since the ones they kept couldn't move the needles. This why franchise like Halo and Gears started to dwindle down in quality over the years.

Sony needs to stop buying up studios. They can't keep the studios they own open.

@Dazman If you don't like consoles don't buy them. And I completely disagree that it's anti-consumer. Companies having their own platform is why we get games like Zelda and The Last of Us. Consumers benefit when companies compete with each other to sell platforms.

@sanderev "Nintendo is outselling sony 3:1 this generation"

Wasn't the switch released in the middle of the previous generation? .-. The PS4 sold 117 millions, so the switch didn't outsell that console 3:1, and the ps5 is probably going to have similar numbers by the end of its lifespan.

That's sad to hear. It looks like the company did a solid job on the new Mario and Luigi, judging from the couple of hours I played so far. And now Nintendo has to seek a new company once again. Fingers crossed then.

The fact that Sony is considering another acquisition after the massive failure of Concord and the shuttering of Firewalk Studios is insane.

Because of Spike Chunsoft we got Natsu-Mon and Bakeru this year and I enjoyed both immensely. I hope they continue to release games for Nintendo so that we can get sequels to those games.

sony does not have enough ips they said well if this deal happens they add more ips. and big ones..and if they buy the company they get of impediments to bloodborne etc etc etc..

Oh boy, I sure love giant companies acquiring other companies! People say your platform need more games? Simple: buy them. Who needs creativity and originality. Just acquire and fire baby! /s

@VoidofLight I've just looked up the director for Mario & Luigi: Brothership and it's listed as Haruyuki Ohashi who far as I can tell has never worked on any Mario game before this 1, let alone any in the Mario & Luigi series.
In addition, the game had 4 producers and only 1 of them has worked on Mario and Luigi games before this 1.

Also, 1 last note, if they can get 1 of the original producers to work with Acquired, doesn't that further undermine the idea that this would put an end to the Mario & Luigi series?

I said it before, but I think it was a major misstep that Nintendo didn't buy out AlphaDream before they went under, imo.

@Zeebor15 Why Would Kadokawa Want to Sell to Sony?

Kadokawa’s business has been hit by a number of high-profile problems recently.

In 2022, the company’s chairman Tsuguhiko Kadokawa – the son of founder Genyoshi – was embroiled in a sponsorship scandal pertaining to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. While he denies the allegations, he ultimately retired from his role of chairman at the company.

Meanwhile, earlier this year, a number of the firm’s websites were the target of a ransomware attack, resulting in the theft of 1.5TB of data.

There has been some online speculation that Kadokawa could be the target of a hostile takeover from a South Korean company, and it wants to remain a Japanese organisation. While unproven, it could perhaps help explain why it’s willing to negotiate with Sony so suddenly.

Mario and Luigi are not a problem, Nintendo can even make them on their own. That lame and shameful is the lost of Mistery Dungeon franchise, so beloved to me, and of course, AI somnium files and all Uchikoshi games. That's horrible.

Sony should be hiring new blood and creating their own studio’s rather than poaching and acquiring studios. It really displays how uncreative and uncommitted the likes of Sony and Microsoft really are.

This acquisition sounds awful. I don't want Sony anywhere near FromSoft or Spike Chunsoft, they'll find a way to ruin those games or just kill off the IPs and studios.

I've also read that this company owns Famitsu as well... Yeah, this would be terrible. Hopefully this is false or the purchase gets blocked.

@johnedwin I never said anything about why Kadokawa wouldn't sell. It makes perfect sense for them to sell to what is essentially a more ethical version of Microsoft (yes, I'm saying killing Michael Jackson is less evil than the stuff Microsoft has done) after all the crap they've been through. I'm just mad at the examples keep bringing up.

We just got Mario and Luigi back man, don't take em away again.

@Olliemar28 It's sold less than Superstar Saga, I can't see it going beyond Brothership

I hope this doesn't happen. Sony has been disappointing me more times with their decisions than Kadokawa has.

Noo not Spike Chunsoft! They need to make more [Pokemon] Mystery Dungeon games on Switch 2, among other niche but fun titles!

@drypaphmrbro we don't really have solid sales figures yet tho?

Stop with the ridiculous click-bait title!

"mario and Luigi future in doubt", are you guys dumb? The future isn't in doubt, it would shift to a new developer or maybe even in-house, but it wouldn't be the end of the Mario and Luigi titles just because of this, they're not the first developer anyway with that franchise so please stop with these BS click-bait titles!

I'm starting to lose respect for Nintendo Life because this is becoming even worse of a trend and its annoying AF!

As for Sony, I hope they don't get control of any of those developers, they'll ruin the future games. I'll never buy another Sony console as it is, but I still buy their games that make it to pc. If this happens, I'll never buy anything that has Sony's grubby hands in it.

@Qphlat27 It's as if that is their goal... Which I hope it is not...

@Serpenterror I guess owning Kadokawa might not have been appealing for nintendo. Hopefully sony will release some spike chunsoft games on the switch 2, and from software, too,

Oh No! You mean we might miss out on another mediocre at best Mario & Luigi game?! Whatever will we do?! Oh wait, Nintendo still owns Mario and Luigi and can get any developer to make another title in the series... and hopefully will be better than Brothership....

@westman98 It’s just getting started. Look how streaming is essentially turning right back into cable

Noteworthy. It doesn't mean Nintendo can't have another studio do it, though, since they have the rights to M&L.

More acquisitions aren’t good for the industry imo but I’d rather Sony own them than Microsoft.

@Samalik Absolutely agreed.
I'm rather tired of all these acquisitions. Sony and Microsoft in particular have been overly eager to just take other companies, and either destroy their IPs, or leave them to rot.

Nintendo needs to stop outsourcing anyway. They used to develop internally. So did square Enix.

I'm always amazed that people complain about exclusives on a Nintendo site. You do realize Nintendo and it's consoles still excists because of those exclusives, if they didn't they would have been gone after the N64.

This isn't Sony Playstation buying. This is Sony Pictures etc. This will purely be for the manga and anime things, Wich might even be a much worse thing.

Sony owns third party studios already. I can’t imagine they would stop these studios working on other platforms if they wanted since it earns them money either way. Sony aren’t even buying Kadokawa for the game studios, they’re buying it for the anime.

Well yes, Sony's always been less about actively putting out games outside of the one yearly AAA and more about making sure less players get games from supposedly multi-platform publishers.

Joke's on you, Sony: Square-Enix snapped free of your leash in May, on my actual birthday no less, and recently Death Stranding got to Xbox. Roll up your sleeves and give your players more Ratchet & Clank, instead.

Does everyone have to sell out?

From what I’ve played so far of Brothership I’m not sure this is such a huge blow. The game could have used more of the Nintendo touch.

The fact that they immediately didn't decline Sony worries me. Hopefully they do the right thing, and if not, hopefully Nintendo can find new devs fit for the job for Mario & Luigi and Pokemon Mystery Dungeon.

merger between Square and Enix was considered since at least 2000; the financial failure in 2001 of Square's first movie, Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, made Enix reluctant to proceed while Square was losing money.[18][19] With the company facing its second year of financial losses, Square approached Sony for a capital injection, and on October 8, 2001, Sony purchased an 18.6% stake in Square.[20] Following the success of both Final Fantasy X and Kingdom Hearts, the company's finances stabilized, and it recorded the highest operating margin in its history in the fiscal year 2002.[21][22] It was announced on November 25, 2002, that Square and Enix's previous plans to merge were to officially proceed, intending to decrease development costs and to compete with foreign developers.[23] As described by Square's president and CEO Yoichi Wada: "Square has also fully recovered, meaning this merger is occurring at a time when both companies are at their height

it was sony that saved square from bankruptcy... and thus allowed the merger with enix...

the loss of fromsoft itself would have no bearing on nintendo because except for dark souls one they really have had no fromsoft games on importance..nintenmdo does not do mergers these days but sony and xbox do acquire companies. sony does not have enough ip they claim here is a way to acquire some big ip for them..

@jowy_sw Nintendo did bought a small share of Rare back then just like how Sony already bought a small share of From Software already. The only difference is that Nintendo sell all of that share to Microsoft with the rest of Rare following after that while Sony right now is trying to buy all of not just From Software but the entire parent company. Had Nintendo not sold their share of Rare to Microsoft then IPs like Banjo, Conker, Jet Force Gemini, Killer Instinct, Blast Corps, and Perfect Dark wouldn't had gone to Microsoft, those IPs would had stay and own by Nintendo with Microsoft only getting Battletoads, Kameo, Sabre Wulf, RC Pro Am, Grabbed by the Ghoulies, Jetpac, and Viva Pinata, IPs that Rare own outside of Nintendo.

@johnedwin Sony didn't save anyone though, they had to do it to keep corporate relationship between both companies in the positive. Also do realize that before Square merge with Enix, they were also a partnership of EA which is why when you buy some of their games back then you'll see some of their logo appeared as Square EA.

My guess is due to the failure of a lot of Square's games back then and their movie, EA broke their partnership and leave them in the dusk. This may be why they are seeking a merger with Enix since Enix is a more local partner to them than a western international company like EA.

This is why games like Parasite Eve which was made by Square EA can't be revive cause EA own a part of that name. This is why when Square Enix made the third game, it's not call Parasite Eve 3 but instead as The 3rd Birthday. This name change alone is what killed the franchise and why it didn't sell well as most fans of the franchise didn't know it was a Parasite Eve game. Even worst it being exclusive on a handheld instead of a home console did not help sell the game at all either. To most it felt like a spinoff or an entirely different game.

A forth entry was also plan but due to the flop of the third game and the fact that they can't call it Parasite Eve 4, heck they obviously don't want to call it The 4th Birthday or The 3rd Birthday: Part II, the game was entirely cancelled with the franchise itself in dormant.

@AlexSora89

Square Enix didn't need to agree to anything, Sony didn't force them.

Another "Sony evil" comment and I didn't need to go to PureXbox for this drivel.

Couldn't care less, considering how mid the new game was.
And Nintendo can just let some other developer make the next game.

Drama queens.

ngl, dont really care as much about mario & luigi, than spike chunsoft games. F.....

Can't wait to play Brothership on my PS5 Pro! 😜

Its future was always in doubt. This is very click baitey

Title is click bait crap!

Update should have been a real article plus explaining what was really going on, not what the "author" of the article was wrongly thinking!

@MeanBeanEgg Yeah they probably don't care about Nintendo fans, but at the same time if they are making a lot of money from Nintendo titles they might not want to stop making them.

@sanderev The most recent numbers for Switch are 141.32 million units sold vs. PS4 with 117.2 million units sold. Outselling? Yes, but hardly 3 to 1 lol. 🤣

@jowy_sw that's... Probably correct. The Japanese equivalent of the FTC is really interested in keeping foreign companies from buying domestic ones. They prefer they set up "local divisions" and then headhunt talent. It's why Tatsuijin was Embracer's most tricky acquisition; even as a technically dead holding company at the time, the Japanese government was not happy with an American holding company owned by a Swedish LLC buying it. It's the reason City Connection isn't part of Embracer now, even though they're basically Clear River's main developer at this point. (Now if only that didn't shackle them to LRG)

it took 9 years for a new mario and luigi game i am sure in that time nintendo will find someone new to make a new mario and luigi game..

Since Sony has lost the japanese market they do everything they can to destroy the japanese industry with their big wallet. If you like japanese videogames then boycott Sony.

@NCChris it doesn’t. But it makes a good headline.

F you, Sony. You want to outstage Microsoft in how wasteful a video game company can be.

@Zeebor15 I've heard that before, yeah. I mean, it's understandable for governments to have power to avoid foreign companies buying local ones and I've seen recently there has been quite a lot of offers from foreign company acquisitions in Japan. And I actually even agree with those regulations (and even that some countries should be more aggressive in that regard).

...I just also agree that they should have bigger regulations for local company mergers considering monopoly is a real thing that could have devastating effects in a market. I know judges in the US are really lenient with company mergers, specially in non essential markets like media but, even if it was a longshot, I believe the Activision purchase should've been blocked and this one probably also should just for the effect on the anime distribution alone (keep in mind, Sony acquired Crunchyrool a couple of years back). Oh well, we'll see where this goes. If the offer is accepted and if it actually goes through.

@Serpenterror To be fair, the share of Rare stock Nintendo bought was not a majority one but it was big, like 40%+ big, bigger than what Sony right now has of FromSoft. And Rare was making exclusive games from Nintendo during all that time until the Microsoft purchase.
The minority stake but with exclusive deal to publish their games on Nintendo only was probably just because of Nintendo's mindset regarding mergers and acquisition more than anything else, believing a hands off approach and merely helping finance and publish Rare games was better for both. The deal probably specified that Rare made games that were not from Nintendo licenced properties were owned by both entities or even Rare themselves. Hence why all the Rare IPs were sold to Microsoft when Nintendo sold their part of Rare to them. Not the same situation as Sony with From Software right now.
And the reason why they sold it? Well, probably because owning 40% of a company that it's other 60% was owned by a competitor was not appealing to them.

As for Sony, the company they are trying to buy owns majority shares of From Software. They would control around 80%+ combined if they decide and manage to buy Kadokawa.

This is very worrying news, I hope this deal falls through. Monopolisation is never a good thing and this particular deal has implications for media outside of just video games. Even then, a lot of Sony's dubious decisions as of late don't exactly make me feel optimistic about them being able to effectively manage all of Kadokawa's sub companies and properties.

So, Sony Acquiring these developers could not only spell doom for Mario and Luigi, but Pokemon Mystery Dungeon as well? HECK NO!!!! KEEP YOUR GRUBBY MITTS OFF OF MY FAVORITE SPINOFFS, SONY, OR ELSE!!!!!!!!!

I hope the Japanese government blocks the deal.

I think this is more fear mongering than anything. Sony as a corporation currently operates on razor thin margins, so much so that they have already ported games like MLB the Show and Lego Horizon to switch. The likelihood that Sony pulls the plug on Switch developers who make more money on Nintendo than they do on PS immediately following a large scale acquisition is relatively low imo. This more likely would have an effect on From Software titles which as of now don't frequently appear I switch anyways.

@eltomo I want Sony and Microsoft to go away. Both are ruining the hobby, buying up all the studios to feed their investors.

Nintendo should stick to what it used to do best, make games.
Stop diverting into movies and theme parks, and concentrating on a better machine to play future games on.
What Sony and Microsoft want they will get?