1988–1994: Walt Disney Computer Software Disney established its own in house gaming unit, WDCS generally used third-party development studios to design spin-off games using its existing portfolio of characters. WDCS failed to meet the high expectations that came with the Disney name, although three of its self-published computer titles – ''Mickey's Runaway Zoo
, Donald's Alphabet Chase and Who Framed Roger Rabbit'' – sold more than 100,000 copies, the industry equivalent of earning a Gold Record. The underlying issues were later attributed by senior Disney executives as being due to low product quality and lack of understanding of the differences between film and games. WDCS also published a series of Nintendo (NES) and Gameboy platform game titles with Japanese video game company
Capcom. Of these titles, 1989's
DuckTales received the most commercial and critical success, selling approximately 1.67 million and 1.43 million copies worldwide respectively, each becoming Capcom's highest-selling titles for their respective platforms. Produced by founding WDCS producer Darlene Waddington,
DuckTales Gameboy version was named "Gameboy Game of the Year" by
PC Player Magazine.
DuckTales continues to be considered a game with high nostalgic interest and was remade in 2013 as
DuckTales: Remastered. Following
DuckTales, WDCS developed and published another NES platform game with Capcom, ''
Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers. Rescue Rangers'' proved to be a commercial success, selling approximately 1.2 million copies worldwide, becoming Capcom's fourth highest-selling game for the Nintendo Entertainment System. Continuing with the success of these titles, Disney continued to find success with another Capcom developed title,
Aladdin and
The Lion King (developed by Westwood Studios) in 1993 and 1994 respectively. This led to a move from self-developed and self-published to funding and development management of games with third parties published the game. On April 15, 1997, Disney Interactive announced it would exit the in-house video game market and reduce its staff by 20%. The company would instead license out Disney properties to third-party developers and publishers, of which the development and production cost risks were transferred to the game companies but reduced the per-unit revenue generated to Disney and effectively yielded a near 100% margin of licensed game sales. On February 27, 1999, Disney Interactive signed a six-game publishing contract with
Activision to release titles for the Nintendo 64, starting with ''
A Bug's Life. In May, Disney signed a worldwide publishing agreement with Nintendo which would mainly focus on video games featuring Mickey Mouse on the Nintendo 64 and Game Boy Color, which would be developed by then-Nintendo partner Rare. The Game Boy Color would also see titles based on Alice in Wonderland and Beauty and the Beast. Another worldwide publishing deal was made with Ubi Soft in the same month for games based on Donald Duck and other Disney animated films which later included Dinosaur. In November, the company published a CD-ROM title based on the game show Who Wants to Be a Millionaire'' which went on to sell one million copies in four weeks. In 2000, Disney Interactive reestablished Buena Vista Interactive as a secondary publishing label, initially being used to publish CD-ROM titles based on
Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. In May 2001, the company signed a deal with
Sony Computer Entertainment to allow the latter to publish titles based on
Atlantis: The Lost Empire,
Monsters, Inc.,
Treasure Planet,
Lilo & Stitch, and
Peter Pan: Return to Never Land on the
PlayStation and
PlayStation 2. In European territories,
Infogrames formerly distributed several of Disney Interactive's PC titles; however, this agreement was later replaced with several separate distribution deals, including
JoWooD Productions in Germany. In February 2002, Disney Interactive announced that they would return to the self-publishing console/handheld market by releasing titles for the
Game Boy Advance, beginning with
Return to Never Land,
Lilo & Stitch, and
Treasure Planet. They later signed a deal with
Ubi Soft to publish and distribute the titles in Europe. In May 2002, the company formed a third publishing label named Plaid Banana Entertainment which would publish games developed by Hulabee Entertainment, a studio formed by
Humongous Entertainment founders Shelley Day and Ron Gilbert.
2003–2007: Buena Vista Games In 2003, The Walt Disney Company announced that it would fully re-enter the self-publishing and core gaming markets, rebranding
Disney Interactive, Inc. as
Buena Vista Games, Inc. (BVG) The Disney Interactive and Buena Vista Interactive brands were retained as publishing labels for children's and core titles, respectively. On May 13, 2005, the company announced they had acquired the video game rights to the
Turok franchise from owners
Classic Media; which had been previously held by
Acclaim Entertainment. On April 27, 2006, Buena Vista Games entered into a publishing agreement with Japanese developer
Q Entertainment where the company would publish four of the developer's titles globally except in Asia; including a Disney-themed version of
Meteos. In September, Buena Vista expanded their developer cycle by purchasing
Climax Racing from the
Climax Group and formed
Fall Line Studios in November to create casual titles for the
Nintendo DS and the
Wii consoles.
2007–2014: Disney Interactive Studios On February 8, 2007, The Walt Disney Company renamed Buena Vista Games to
Disney Interactive Studios as part of a larger company initiative to phase out the Buena Vista brand that year. The studio publishes both Disney and non-Disney branded video games for all platforms worldwide, with titles that feature its consumer brands including Disney,
ABC,
ESPN, and
Touchstone (which is used as a label for Disney). In July 2007, the studio acquired
Junction Point Studios. On June 5, 2008, Disney Interactive Studios and the Walt Disney Internet Group, merged into a single business unit now known as the
Disney Interactive Media Group, and it merged its subsidiary
Fall Line Studios with its sister studio, Avalanche Software, in January 2009. In February 2009, Disney Interactive acquired Gamestar, a Chinese game development company. On September 8, 2009, Disney Interactive announced that it had acquired
Wideload Games. In November 2010, the executive Graham Hopper left the company. He announced his departure via an internal e-mail saying "the time has come for me to move on from the company and set my sights on new horizons." DIS in October 2012 announced "Toy Box", a cross platform gaming initiative where Pixar and Disney characters will interact from a console game to multiple mobile and online applications. The first Toy Box cross platform game is
Disney Infinity based on the
Toy Story 3 game's Toy Box mode crossed with a toy line. After the purchase of
Lucasfilm by The Walt Disney Company in 2012, Disney Interactive assumed the role of developing
Star Wars games for the
casual gaming market, while
Electronic Arts would develop
Star Wars games for the core gaming market through an exclusive license (although
LucasArts did retain the ability to license
Star Wars games to other developers for the casual gaming market). At
E3 2013, Disney and Square Enix released a teaser trailer for
Kingdom Hearts III, after going seven years of not declaring any console
Kingdom Hearts game since
Kingdom Hearts II. The game would release nearly six years later in January 2019. Disney Interactive Studios has lost more than $200 million per year from 2008 to 2012 during a period in which it shut down Canadian game development studio
Propaganda Games, British developer
Black Rock Studio and Austin-based game developing unit
Junction Point Studios and its co-president John Pleasants stepped down in November 2013 after the launch of
Disney Infinity. After the cancellation of
Disney Infinity, Disney Interactive Studios closed in 2016. ==List of games==