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Report: Xbox interested in buying Warner Bros' games arm

Report: Xbox interested in buying Warner Bros' games arm

Microsoft is apparently interested in snapping up entertainment giant Warner Bros' games division.

That's according to a report from The Information, which says that the Xbox firm has joined the likes of Activision Blizzard, EA and Take-Two in wanting to buy Warner Bros Interactive Entertainment (WBIE).

The deal would see the Big M acquiring the studios and staff that are part of the WBIE business, with projects tied to Warner Bros IP – such as the Batman Arkham series and Harry Potter – not being part of the deal.

News that Warner Bros' games arm was up for sale broke during June 2020. The company was apparently also set to announce new Batman and Harry Potter games at this year's E3 before the event was cancelled due to the COVID-19 coronavirus.

If Microsoft were to buy Warner Bros' games arm, it would be the largest acquisition the firm has made in recent years. At E3 2018, the Big M announced that it had bought Ninja Theory, Playground, Compulsion and Playdead, as well as the fact it had set up a brand new studio in Santa Monica called The Initiative. Before the year was out, it bought RPG vets Obsidian and InXile, before snapping up Double Fine by E3 2019.

The company has also launched a brand new outfit dedicated to overseeing the Age of Empires IP.


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PCGamesInsider Contributing Editor

Alex Calvin is a freelance journalist who writes about the business of games. He started out at UK trade paper MCV in 2013 and left as deputy editor over three years later. In June 2017, he joined Steel Media as the editor for new site PCGamesInsider.biz. In October 2019 he left this full-time position at the company but still contributes to the site on a daily basis. He has also written for GamesIndustry.biz, VGC, Games London, The Observer/Guardian and Esquire UK.