You might remember that Asmodee, was purchased by the Embracer Group, for the low sum of $3.01 billion (Yes that’s with a B). It would seem that Embrace group has DEEP POCKETS, as they snatched up Middle-earth Enterprises, which controls the intellectual property licensing rights to The Lord of the Rings franchise. Those rights were previously held by The Saul Zaentz Company, which licensed out the property to New Line Cinema for Peter Jackson’s celebrated Lord of the Rings film trilogy.
While Embracer Group does not own Lord of the Rings — those rights are still owned and managed by the Tolkien Estate — it does mean that Embracer now holds sway over any Lord of the Rings material adapted into different mediums such as film, television, board games, theme parks and of course, video games. In a press release, Embracer cited the various Lord of the Rings adaptations currently in development, including the upcoming Amazon streaming series “The Lord of the Rings: Rings of Power,” which is set thousands of years before the original trilogy and will cover the Dark Lord Sauron’s ascent as the eponymous Lord of the Rings.
“I am truly excited to have The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, one of the world’s most epic fantasy franchises join the Embracer family, opening up more transmedia opportunities including synergies across our global group. I am thrilled to see what lies in the future for this IP with Freemode and Asmodee as a start within the group. Going forward, we also look forward to collaborating with both existing and new external licensees of our increasingly stronger IP portfolio,” says Lars Wingefors, Founder and Group CEO Embracer Group.
Embracer also gave a hint as to possible future adaptations of Lord of the Rings with films focusing on specific characters. Per the press release:
“Other opportunities include exploring additional movies based on iconic characters such as Gandalf, Aragorn, Gollum, Galadriel, Eowyn and other characters from the literary works of J.R.R. Tolkien, and continue to provide new opportunities for fans to explore this fictive world through merchandising and other experiences.”
Embracer did not specify the acquisition price for Middle-earth Enterprises alone but estimated the total cost of all eight acquisitions at $780 million (or 8.2 billion Swedish krona). Some of the other companies that Embracer added during its buying spree include Tuxedo Labs (maker of the game “Teardown”), Limited Run Games (a distributor of rare physical copy video games), Tripwire Interactive (“Killing Floor,” “Red Orchestra”) and Tatsujin (“Zero Wing,” the source of early 2000s Engrish meme “All your base are belong to us.”).
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