Bandai and Namco To Merge

Entertainment company Bandai announced today that they've purchased game creator Namco and as of September of this year will be merging into a single company. From the article: "Bandai shares fell 2.5 percent to 2,335 yen as of 2:27 p.m. in Tokyo, after dropping as much as 3.8 percent. Namco shares rose 8.8 percent to 1,530 yen, headed for their biggest gain since November 2003. The companies' shares were suspended for the first one and a half hours of trading, following an earlier report of the merger plan by the Nihon Keizai newspaper."

Comments

tekken

[morgothan]

So long as they dont butcher tekken, I guess its ok.

Re:tekken

[Anonymous Coward]

"So long as they dont butcher tekken, I guess its ok."

• Glad we've got your approval. I'll inform management that they can proceed with the merger.

Re:tekken

[superpulpsicle]

What do you mean? It's already butchered. The best one is still Tekken Tag Tournament. Didn't you know every sequel add 1 character and subtract 2. Only way Namco gets my approval is a Tekken Soul Calibre merge with 100 characters.

Re:tekken

[morgothan]

??? tekken 5 added three new charecters, and brought back a bunch of others, in fact the only charecters I can think of that are not in tekken 5 are kuni, armor king, gon and dr b. And most of armors kings moves that are worth anything king has. As for gon and dr b. they are joke charecters, and kuni, well raven is kind of like her, but not really, and kuni sucked anyway.

Re:tekken

[Anonymous Coward]

Ick why would you want to corrupt Soul Calibur like that?

Re:tekken

[Anonymous Coward]

I've never understood why anyone likes soul calibre. It seems like a game for button mashers to me. Someone who has never seen the game before can pick a large majority of characters and through sheer luck beat someone who has been playing for awhile.

I prefer tekken. There's such a thing as playing defensively. I should mention I haven't played 5 yet, so maybe they butchered it in the last couple years, but I can always hope.

Re:tekken

[Soul-Burn666]

I disagree.
The fact you can just pickup the controller and a random character and seem to play reasonably is actually a good thing, it means the game is forgiving for newbies. But button mashing can only get you this far.
An experienced player will block impact or parry your attacks, cancel your throws, play mind games through fake moves or high mobility and throw so much pressure on you that make a mistake after mistake and even give him enough time to finish you off with style using some unblockable.

What I agree though is that the game is much more offensive than defensive.

Hmm

[Daetrin]

Was Bandai the one that there were rumors of Nintendo trying to buy out awhile ago? This would make them a much more valuable acquisiton, but probably more difficult to actually acquire.

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Bandai's management has been trying to fight off a Nintendo acquisition for over a year now. Bandai is a family-run business, just like Nintendo (Iwata is Yamauchi's son-in-law and is therefore considered part of the original founder's family), and they've been trying to keep it all under the same roof, since they are a very powerful media conglomerate with worldwide reach. Acquisition by Nintendo would probably be very good for Bandai's core licenses (at the cost of the games only being available on Nintendo's systems), but it would mean the end of a dynasty. If Namco's management gains any kind of power within the new company, expect that struggle to continue. Namco's been rumored to be fighting off a Nintendo acquisition as well. :)

Nintendo still maintains their investment in and partnership with Bandai, regardless. They also maintain a growing partnership with Namco as well (closing old wounds between the two has helped both companies to make a healthy bit of money in recent years).

Re:Hmm

[Lynxara]

Are you aware of how big Bandai is? Nintendo trying to buy them out would be like Apple trying to buy Disney.

Bandai has huge entertainment assets for animation, live-action, toys, apparel, all kinds of things, as well as a gigantic international distribution chain. Now all that marketing muscle is going to be behind Namco's original video game properties as well as Bandai's licenses.

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you aware of how big Nintendo is? Nintendo trying to buy them out would be like, well, Nintendo trying to buy Bandai.

Keep up with the news, Lynxara. Learn how to use Babelfish or Amikai in the process too, while you're at it, since this has been a long on-going story since Bandai's management started making public commentary on their position WRT Nintendo. Bandai has been fighting off a Nintendo buy-out for several months now. The /. story you're reading right now is just the latest in that string of events, since they've now, as the parent poster correctly pointed out, made it much more difficult for Nintendo to accomplish a complete buy-out. Namco, another potential buy-out target of Nintendo's from recent history, was a very smart choice, since they would likely share in Bandai's goal of remaining independent of Nintendo's ownership.

Just imagine...

[Retroneous]

Ridge Racer cars shaped like Hello Kitty. Tekken consisting solely of characters from Digimon and a world where your main targets in Ace Combat are shaped like the star of freakin' Cowboy BeBop.

The future is...wait a bit...not yet...now!

Re:Just imagine...

[DamienNightbane]

Well, the Falken in Ace Combat 05 does look quite a bit like the Swordfish...

Re:Just imagine...

[Anonymous Coward]

Meh. Release "Tekken vs. Trugun" and all is forgiven.

Nintendo Games... finally?

[Elranzer]

With Bandai being *in* with Nintendo, maybe they will finally force Namco to release some of their games multi-console. Soul Calibur 3 being a PS2-exclusive is very disappointing, as that slow system is not built for fighting games. Maybe Nintendo will finally buy Bandai (and Namco along with it) and Soul Calibur 4 will be Revolution-exclusive. Mwa-ha!

What this means to us.

[AzraelKans]

Either we FINALLY get some good Dragon Ball Z/anime games (or at least not as crappy) or all Namco games get merged with anime characters and are launched at subpar quality.

Either way prepare to read this line in the future:

Heihachi Vs San Goku!

Re:What this means to us.

[KDR_11k]

Namco has been licensing obscure cartoon shows for some time now, lately they've announced games featuring Gumby, Peanuts and Hello Kitty

Fight for Life is so much better

[bile]

Tekken? That's that shitty fighting game for the PSX/2 right? Everyone knows the best 3D fighter is Fight for Live on the Atari Jaguar. And Shadow for the 3DO is the best fighter period. If they made Tekken 6 more like DOA... i would so play it... or brought back Gon.

Merge?

[ultramk]

Merge my ass, Namco just rolled them up.

m-

Re:Merge?

[American AC in Paris]

Like that's possible.

Dream on.

[AzraelKans]

Sorry, but If Namco and Bandai have merged that means they dont need anyone else, Namco and Bandai (together) sum up to a lot of money and some very good and strong franchises. (Besides if N wanted to merge with Bandai they certainly wouldnt have taken Namco, someone said NO at that final contract Im not sure which though) I do agree their titles should be multi platform and theres a strong rumor soulcalibur 3 and tekken 5 will be available for xbox and gc soon.

Re:Dream on.

[MaverickUW]

you're right, but you haven't read the articles or kept up on their history.

For every bandai share, owners will get 1.5 shares of the new company compared to 1 to 1 for the Namco shareholders. Nintendo happens to own a decent chunk of Bandai already, which means that it will own a decent chunk of the new company. So they don't need the money, but they've both already got major Nintendo partnerships

Ugh

[Pluvius]

Man, I hope Bandai mostly stays out of Namco's affairs. Considering Bandai's track record with video games, this could be really bad.

Rob

Re:Ugh

[Anonymous Coward]

Bandai's games tend to sell extremely well in Japan.

Do the research on Banpresto's (Bandai subsidiary) Super Robot Taisen series some time. These consistently upset huge names in gaming to take the number one sales spot on all platforms. And if you're a mecha anime and strategy game fan, they are pretty fun. Mindless "gaiden" kind of storylines, but still fun.

Anyway, I'd say Namco fans have nothing to worry about. If anything, Namco's game development efforts will most likely take priority, given their legacy and old prestige from their glory days. The Japanese see Namco as Sega-Lite, whereas Bandai is seen as being like a combo of Hasbro and Disney. Namco clearly holds higher esteem among Japanese gamers. Bandai's games will be seen to benefit from Namco's expertise, while the Bandai name will not negatively Namco's name or development.

Just one question:

[TripMaster Monkey]

Will the new company name be Namdai or Banco?

("Namco Bandai Holdings Inc." is so weak...)

Please vote for your favorite below:

Re:Just one question:

[Anonymous Coward]

Banamdaico!

Re:Just one question:

[ConceptJunkie]

They wanted "Bamco", but Emeril threatened to sue.

Re:Just one question:

[oldwolf13]

One word.

Bandriva.

Re:Just one question:

[deathwombat]

If they change their name to Banco, what happens if they merge with Rupture Industries?

Do they become Bancorupt?

Re:Just one question:

[Elranzer]

Actually this is what the company will be called after all of the mergings are finalized:

Nintendo

Finally, what we've always wanted.

[oboylet]

I'll be able to play Tekken and Ridge Racer on my Bandai Pippin @World!

Oh hell no...

[MatW]

I'm starting to see Ultraman versus Jin Kazama special round battle coming up.

Oh Great...

[servognome]

Now we're gonna see Mighty Morphin Pac-Man Ranger toys, TV shows, and video games

phew

[sakura the mc]

at least the new company isnt named GENOM.
i thought this was the beginning of a mega tokyo.

i guess we wont have to worry until they merge with square-enix.

then we can panic.

you know what this means

[UltimaL337Star]

marvel vs capcom x namco in angelgrove