Warner Bros Acquires Turbine

The latest studio acquisition involves MMO developer Turbine and Warner Bros Home Entertainment which snapped up the Boston-based studio today. Founded in 1994, Turbine has had reasonable success with its MMORPG titles, the most successful being The Lord of the Rings Online. With the Turbine acquisition, Warner now holds all the rights to create games based on Tolkien’s works and the only piece of the jigsaw that was missing was the MMO rights. According to Warner, Turbine was also the largest privately-held online gaming studio in North America.“We have been looking to expand access to our online worlds to more players and more markets,” said Turbine’s CEO Jim Crowley.“This acquisition is very exciting because it allows us to expand globally while continuing to focus on creating spectacular online games that our loyal fans and players have come to expect.”“Turbine is recognized globally for its industry-leading technology, groundbreaking graphics and its unique ability to create and operate massive and persistent online worlds which greatly enhance players’ social gaming experiences,” said Martin Tremblay, president, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment.“The Lord of the Rings Online and Dungeons & Dragons Online have both been an enormous success for Turbine and we look forward to working with their talented development team to continue creating award-winning online games.”Turbine has had mixed success over the years with its MMORPG titles but did push the boundaries early on with  Asheron’s Call. Turbine also developed Dungeons & Dragons Online which eventually moved over to a free to play model after the game failed to really take off.