>Square Enix is bringing more of its stories to the page. The video game company has announced a new deal with Penguin Random House Publisher Services that will bring all-new original titles from the company behind iconic game properties from Space Invaders to Final Fantasy and Tomb Raider to the American market under its own banner for the first time. Square Enix is known primarily in the U.S. as a video game company, but in its native Japan, it’s also responsible for books, magazines and manga publications centered around its many properties. In the past, the company has licensed those properties — and translations of its own original material — to existing U.S. publishers, most notably Dark Horse Comics, which has published material based on Final Fantasy, NieR: Automata and Bravely Default, as well as Tomb Raider comic books, in recent years.
Will this be a big blow to them? Their Final Fantasy artbook localizations always seemed to do quite well.
Is there some kind of Cabal gutting Dark Horse of all it's properties to sell them off like they did with SEARS or something?
Camden Reed
Speaking of which, when are they gonna lose the Alien/Predator license?
Cooper Peterson
Dark Horse is fucking dying mate
You think Sakai left after decades because IDW was offering more money or something
You think Mignola hurried the ending to Hellboy because he was bored
Alexander Ramirez
why isn't there a Final Fantasy 8 comic
Christian Hughes
It's not like they made FF comics or something (although funnily enough Mike Mignola did covers for an unreleased Final Fantasy IV comic written by Kurt Busiek way back in the 90's)
Isaac Wright
>Dark Horse Comics, which has published material based on [...] NieR: Automata There's a NieR manga?
Ryan Lee
i didn't even know Dark Horse had a Square Enix license so this probably won't a big deal. That said it's another sign that Dark Horse is dying.
Ryder Watson
It's some NA encyclopedia. I don't think they had anything to do with the short story translations though; pretty sure that was Viz.
They brought that Amano boxset over a few years ago and were in the process of localizing the Ultimatum Guides. I'm assuming they'll get the third one out before their contract's up.
Camden Miller
>kingdom hearts Why isn't FF Marvel?
Zachary Powell
Marvel doesn't even publish any Disney comics (meaning Mickey, Donald, Goofy, etc) IDW publishes the newer comics and Fanta publishes the classic Barks/Rosa/Gottfredson stuff Dark Horse actually published an OGN tie-in to the Dumbo live-action remake, and they're also going to publish OGNs for Aladdin and The Lion King
So when licensing deals like this fall apart/expire, does this generally mean they don't do any more runs of already released stuff? Just weighing up whether or not I should pull the trigger on the Bravely Default artbooks now.
They might come sometime considering they get all the Nintendo first-party stuff.
Julian Myers
Soon. It's Disney now.
Isaiah Martin
>Lose half your properties >Still don't move forward with your Moebius and Darrow comics despite announcing them years ago >Let half your Manara stuff go out of print they don't even bother with the stuff they have, it's like they want to die
Eli Baker
What about hellboy?
Anthony White
What about it?
Jackson Carter
Okay now this is a big deal for Dark Horse. Most of the rest has been meaningless. This will be a problem.
Nolan Gray
DH has been publishing Duck/Mouse comics like Disney Hamlet, Starring Donald Duck
Juan Green
What happens to the Berserk license if Dark Horse go under? All I really care about from them. I'm hoping Vertical pick it up somehow if the company goes bust.
Jackson Barnes
They've had the Final Fantasy license and just sat on it? Fuckers deserve to die.
Christian Moore
REPRINT TERADA'S JOURNEY TO THE WEST MANGA ALREADY YOU FUCKS AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
See , they brought over quite a bit of good stuff.
Fucking hell, they're losing properties left and right. Star Wars, Conan, Buffy, Usagi Yojimbo, The Goon, now this.
What do they still have? Hellboy, manga like Berzerk, the Black Hammer universe and Berger's line that nobody really gives a shit about
Jordan Phillips
I'm worried about Berserk and Black Hammer. I think Black Hammer could potentially make it on its own if Lemire started his own company with that as the foundation.
Jacob Flores
This is the first I've heard about Usagi and Goon. When did those happen?
Aiden Diaz
In the last few months. Sakai's relaunching Yojimbo at IDW, and Powell is publishing Goon under his own Albatross Funnybooks label now
Black Hammer's going to be fine. Legendary optioned it for movies and shows a few months back.
Blake King
Get back to me when Figaro no Kekkon gets localized. Then maybe I'll give a shit.
Luis Miller
Stop! Stop, they're already dead...
Luke Wright
Speaking of Hellboy, is it wholly owned by Mignolia or does Dark Horse have a piece? I ask because in the event of Dark Horse going under I wonder what the chances are that Mignolia could bring Hellboy over to DC or Image for reprints ala Bendis and his Jinxworld stuff.
Good to know. Lemire starting his own comic company would be pretty interesting to see though.
This is why I'm probably never going to bother buying the recent Hellboy trade paper back re-releases or Berserk hardcovers. I don't want to have a sizeable collection of them only to hear Dark Horse going out of business and stopping them from going to print.
Oliver Long
It goes back to the original rights holder who would then be open for negotiations.
>I'm hoping Vertical pick it up somehow if the company goes bust Nobody is stupid enough for that. They'd need to re-release it from scratch or work out the weirdest license deal ever.
Joshua Brown
It's all owned by Mignola, including the stuff that he did not write himself. He'd be more likely to bring it over to Image for reprints, mostly because DC seems to get a compilation copyright when they reprint stuff, like The Invisibles. Morrison owns the copyright and trademark to it, but DC gets one for the currently published collection.
