THQ moving away from kids' games
Plans greater focus on its own IP.
THQ is planning to move focus away from licensed kids' games and onto its own IPs, CEO Brian Farrell has announced.
According to CVG, Farrell told the Credit Suisse 2010 Technology Conference, "We are curtailing some of our investments in the younger licensed products; those are the things that are not working as well as they used to.
"But the real win in the industry and for us is that we think there's significant value creation will come from owned IP like Homefront, like uDraw, like Red Faction, like Saint's Row.
"They're obviously things we control, with no outside royalty on [them], and things we can do trans-media partnerships [with], license out," he continued.
"That's the key to real value creation for us. We're very pleased with our initial efforts in that regard, but we think there's more to come [in terms of] owned IP generation."
THQ seems to have been the go-to publisher for quick cartoon tie-ins in recent years. It's put out Megamind, Marvel Super Hero Squad, SpongeBob SquarePants and The Last Airbender games, to name but a few.
While it seems this part of its business is in decline, the publisher has enjoyed some success with its own new franchises. Both action adventure Darksiders and Wii platformer de Blob performed well enough to earn sequels.
Its recent Wii add-on - the uDraw tablet - seems to have got off to a strong start too. Farrell told Joystiq, "Our early reports are looking very promising, and I know we're doing very well at Walmart, Best Buy and Toys R Us - outlets like that. And we're getting really good first-look feedback from a lot of things like parenting magazines and such."
As well as forthcoming FPS Homefront, it also has a new original IP in the works with movie director Guillermo del Toro. A reveal is rumoured for this month's Spike VGA Awards.