Bizarre to work on non-racing property for Activision, too

Activision’s EVP of publishing has told Develop that Bizarre Creations, which the publisher acquired two weeks ago, won’t just be boosting the firm’s bid for racing games – it will be working on a franchise the publisher owns as well.

Speaking in an interview conducted by the Develop team and printed in our sister magazine MCV (available to download here), Robin Kaminsky told us: "We believe in brands and franchises not individual titles, so we’ll be working with Bizarre to develop a great concept and brand in racing, as well as working with their second team, which is very talented in the action genre.

"This team will most probably be working on a property that Activision already owns."

Activision owns properties such as Call of Duty, Tony Hawks, Guitar Hero and has produced a number of licenced games – it’s also reading a James Bond game for next year. The publisher acquired Bizarre Creations two weeks ago, saying the studio would be helping it create a new IP-based driving game franchise as it looks to enter new genres. The studio recently made Project Gotham Racing 4 for Microsoft Game Studios and is completing shooter The Club for Sega.

Bizarre’s popular Xbox Live Arcade team won’t be squandered either, said Kaminsky, who added that Activision is growing its XBLA game slate, with titles in development to launch during the Christmas season.

"Obviously the first priority is the large-scaled titles, but [Bizarre Creations] have a very interesting process in terms of their ability to develop games for Xbox Live and we’re interested in working with them on that."