Take 2 label is dead
Long live Gotham Games
In a bizarre move, Take 2 last night announced that they will no longer be releasing any games under their Take 2 monicker. Henceforth, all new releases will be branded as coming from Rockstar Games, Gathering Of Developers or Gotham Games, the latter being a new label which will "specifically focus on publishing outstanding content accessible to consumers of all ages at a variety of price points". In other words, all the left-overs that didn't fit in on one of the other labels. As a result, Gotham's initial line-up includes everything from Austin Powers Pinball on the PSOne to the forthcoming Xbox version of Serious Sam. Normally we would have expected Sam to appear on the GOD label, but apparently that's only for PC games, so no no no, off to Gotham you go. The same problem afflicts SCI's Conflict : Desert Storm, which Take 2 are publishing in the USA. Because it's being released on console as well as PC, it now looks set to appear on the Gotham label alongside Celebrity Deathmatch and a plethora of PlayStation budget releases. Whatever the logic (or lack thereof) behind this "new global branding strategy", Take 2 CEO Kelly Sumner seems to be pretty enthusiastic about it all, spouting a stream of gibberish about intellectual properties, the mass market, household penetration rates, and how the company has "a solid pipeline of diversified products". If you want to try and work it out for yourselves, read the press release.