As Hasbro Interactive Early history Hasbro Interactive was formed late in 1995 to allow Hasbro to enter the
video game market. Several Hasbro properties, such as
Monopoly and
Scrabble, had already been made into successful video games by licensees such as
Virgin Interactive. With Hasbro's game experience, video games seemed like a natural extension of the company and a good opportunity for revenue growth. Hasbro Interactive's objective was to develop and publish games based on Hasbro properties. In January 1997, the company announced it would publish games for the
PlayStation.
Strong growth (1997–1999) In 1997, revenues increased 145% going from US$35 million to $86 million. Hasbro Interactive was growing so fast that there was talk of reaching $1 billion in revenues by 2002. and followed this up on August 14 by purchasing
MicroProse for $70 million. With those acquisitions Hasbro Interactive revenues increased 127% in 1998 to $196 million and profits of $23 million. In 1998, Hasbro signed an agreement with
Majesco Sales, whereas Majesco would publish/distribute games under a licensing agreement for various Nintendo consoles, notably the
Game Boy Color. Majesco and Hasbro also worked on the
Sega Dreamcast adaptation of
Q*bert. In April 1999, the company secured a licensing deal with
Namco to develop and publish titles based on over 11 Namco franchises.
Losses and dot-com bubble burst (1999–2000) Hasbro Interactive became the number 3 video game publisher within three years of its founding. But in 1999, Hasbro Interactive lost $74 million on revenues of $237 million a growth of just 20% over the previous year. The sale included nearly all of its video game related rights and properties, the Atari brand and Hasbro's Games.com division, developer MicroProse and all of its software titles up to that point except for the Avalon Hill property. Hasbro Interactive's sale price was $100 million, $95 million as 4.5 million common shares of Infogrames and $5 million in cash. The deal was completed on January 29, 2001. Majesco had ended its relationship with Hasbro once Infogrames took over the gaming company.
Infogrames Interactive/Atari Interactive Following the purchase, Infogrames renamed Hasbro Interactive, Inc. as Infogrames Interactive, Inc., and rebranded many of its subsidiaries under the Infogrames brand. The company ceased work as a full publisher, with these responsibilities transferring over to sibling company
infogrames, Inc. in North America, which had a similar pattern of renamings from GT Interactive. The company at this point only existed as a license and copyright holder for any properties formerly published under Hasbro Interactive, while the Infogrames, Inc. subsidiary licensed the Atari name and logo from Atari Interactive and changed its name to
Atari, Inc. using it to develop, publish and distribute games for all major
video game consoles and
personal computers under the Atari brand. Infogrames would still maintain ownership of the original Atari properties received through Hasbro, which are kept in its Hasbro Interactive originated placeholder, Atari Interactive, Inc. With continued money problems, in July 2007, Atari announced it had sold back the remainder of its Hasbro agreement to it for $19 million. The following month, Hasbro announced it had entered into a new multi-year casual publishing deal with
Electronic Arts. However, Atari retained its
Dungeons & Dragons license and also announced to publish a
video game based on
Jenga under the franchise owners Pokonobe Associates. In December 2009, Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast filed a lawsuit against
Atari SA for a breach and violation of its exclusive video game contract for
Dungeons & Dragons after the company sold its international distribution arms to
Namco Bandai Games earlier in the year and supplying a distribution agreement with them, proclaiming that it violated its licensing agreement. Atari responded back by saying the allegations were "unfounded" and that Hasbro was attempting to unfairly obtain the license rights back. In August 2011, the lawsuit was settled out of court with Hasbro reclaiming the licensing rights back from Atari, while Atari could continue to publish new
Dungeons & Dragons titles under a non-exclusive agreement. On January 21, 2013, all of Atari SA's North American subsidiaries, including Atari Interactive, Inc., filed petitions for relief under
Chapter 11, Title 11, United States Code in the
United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York in an attempt to separate itself from its profit-losing parent company. They emerged from bankruptcy one year later. ==Subsidiaries==