Activision and Vivendi merge, officially a 2 ton gorilla

Yeah, yeah, we're late to the news. Let's get it out of our systems, shall we? All better? Good. The simple fact is we were wrist-deep in poopy Fancast yesterday, so the news had to wait. If, by some miracle, you haven't heard, Activision has merged with Vivendi Games, owners of Blizzard (World of Warcraft). So, the number one third party publisher has merged with the owners of basically the most successful game ever made to create Activision Blizzard. Lots of follow-up stories have broken since then, and instead of recounting them all here, we present you with a nice list culled from the headlines at Joystiq. Feel free to peruse them at your leisure. Make sure you do though, or you'll look like a fool when the subject comes up at your next gamer cocktail party.

• Activision and Blizzard parent merge in $18 billion deal
• Blizzard wants you to know that merger won't affect their games
• GameSetWatch analyzes Activision/Vivendi merger
• The Activision Blizzard conference call
• Activision stock way up after merger news
• Joystiq Podcast Roundtable - Blizzavision ... Actiblizzard?