Namco Bandai now owns 95% of D3 Publisher -- Joystiq

Namco Bandai now owns 95% of D3 Publisher

by Xav de Matos { Mar 18th 2009 at 1:00AM }

Namco Bandai has gobbled up 19,990 shares of D3 Publisher, giving them ownership of 95.02% of the company. Siliconera reports the house that Pacman built has purchased the majority of the company at a combined buyout value of 1,239,380,000 yen ($12.55 million). In mid February, Namco Bandai -- who at the time made deals with D3's board, resulting in a 70% ownership of the company -- announced plans to purchase the remaining 30% of D3 Publisher stock. The remaining shares were purchased at the originally announced offer of ¥62,000 (US$626) per share (which sounds crazy to us).

D3 Publisher owns the overseas rights to the Ben 10 franchise as well as the Vicious Engine, the back end that powered such PSP titles as Dead Head Fred and 300: March to Glory. D3 is also responsible for Dark Sector and the OneChanbara franchise. Can someone say "buyers remorse?"

Tags: business, buyout, d3-publisher, namco-bandai

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Comtar @ Mar 18th 2009 1:10AM

Wow maybe that means the next Matt Hazard game will have real game characters. :P

ImSooFlye @ Mar 18th 2009 1:13AM

That has to be the best picture ever lol, that is so dirty.

Landover123 @ Mar 18th 2009 1:17AM

You can only hope, huh Comtar? :P

Landover Baptist Church

Comtar @ Mar 18th 2009 1:46AM

Hey for your information, I liked Matt Hazard. Good clean mindless entertainment with water guns, fem-bots, zombies, cowboys, Nazis, Russians, explosives and shotguns. What games has all these things at the same time?

Oh and Neill Patrick Harris.

flanker22 @ Mar 18th 2009 2:30AM

^had such undeserved poor sales :(

Jose El Maton @ Mar 18th 2009 1:35AM

Dead Head Fred was a good game. Long for a PSP game, too. I know it won't happen, but I was hoping to see another one of those, preferably for PS2.

Demon G Sides @ Mar 18th 2009 2:03AM

Umm... D3 Also, kinda, you know, published Puzzle Quest series. I think that's worth noting.

Freezer @ Mar 18th 2009 2:14AM

Indeed. You'd think PQ would be worth an aside, at least. (Well, maybe not Galactrix..)

Xav de Matos @ Mar 18th 2009 2:21AM

Yeah, but then I couldn't make any hilarious observations about it. Clearly the company has some good assets... however, Matt Hazzard is NOT one of them.

AoE @ Mar 18th 2009 11:46AM

@Xav de Matos,

Amusing sure, but hardly hilarious. Although maybe I am jaded? D3 is my favorite B-grade publisher these days. How can you argue with EDF 2017, Mad Trax, Puzzle Quest, and OneChanbara? All great games; even if the production values are a bit low... they're still somehow more entertaining than many of the titles AAA publishers foist on us.

Viridium @ Mar 18th 2009 6:37AM

I realize that most people disagree, but for what it is and as a budget title (in NA anyways), Onechanbara is fantastic. I had it preordered and am still loving it!

baby sea tuna @ Mar 18th 2009 8:55AM

I disagree. I thought Onechanbara was dogshit. It was ugly, boring, repetitive, buggy, and poorly designed.

And, even at $40, offensively overpriced.

Viridium @ Mar 18th 2009 9:49AM

Then you'd fall under my opening statement of "most people disagree". I don't find it ugly or buggy. The camera takes some getting used to, but I have no real complaints about the design. And it's a button masher, of course there's some repetition. That's why I also qualified my opinion with "for what it is, it's fantastic".

Perhaps people had expectations that were too high? I dunno. All I know is that I'm still loving it.

aerobica @ Mar 18th 2009 7:05AM

D3 has been one of my favorite publisher's! Buyer's remorse my ass! I genuinely enjoy Onechanbara, Matt Hazard, Dark Sector (I liked it more than Gears of War... which everyone compared it to), Puzzle Quest (as mentioned), and EARTH DEFENSE FORCE!!! They have plenty of good properties.Any I'm forgetting?

~Snipes~ (PSN slycooper_rocker) @ Mar 18th 2009 10:49PM

dead head fred

Muu @ Mar 18th 2009 8:44AM

D3 has published tons of shovelware, as well as a few gems here and there. Many of their games show a genuine lack of budget in some way or another (like Onechanbara looking like a flashback to the 90s if you stop looking at your player chars), not necessarily a bad trait these days when the large devs seem incapable of balancing their budget books.

The sea of mediocrity they usually sail in probably won't appeal to many users in these kinds of sites, but looking at the overall set of releases they're still probably doing more original things than the titans with their uber-budget sequels -- whether it's any good or not being an entirely different problem altogether, of course.