Hasbro Interactive was an American video game production and

publishing Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, newsp ...

subsidiary of

Hasbro Hasbro, Inc. (; a syllabic abbreviation of its original name, Hassenfeld Brothers) is an American multinational conglomerate holding company incorporated and headquartered in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. Hasbro owns the trademarks and products of K ...

, the large

game A game is a structured form of play, usually undertaken for entertainment or fun, and sometimes used as an educational tool. Many games are also considered to be work (such as professional players of spectator sports or games) or art (suc ...

and

toy A toy or plaything is an object that is used primarily to provide entertainment. Simple examples include toy blocks, board games, and dolls. Toys are often designed for use by children, although many are designed specifically for adults and pet ...

company. Several of its studios were closed in early 2001 and most of its properties were sold to

Infogrames Atari SA (formerly Infogrames Entertainment SA) is a French video game holding company headquartered in Paris. Its subsidiaries include Atari Interactive and Atari, Inc. It is the current owner of the Atari brand through Atari Interactive. ...

(now Atari SA) which completed its studio's closures at the end of 2001.

History

Hasbro Interactive was formed late in 1995 in order to compete in the

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This feedba ...

arena. Several Hasbro properties, such as

Monopoly A monopoly (from Greek language, Greek el, μόνος, mónos, single, alone, label=none and el, πωλεῖν, pōleîn, to sell, label=none), as described by Irving Fisher, is a market with the "absence of competition", creating a situati ...

and

Scrabble ''Scrabble'' is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, each bearing a single letter, onto a game board divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words that, in crossword fashion, read left t ...

, had already been made into successful video games by licensees such as

Virgin Interactive Virgin Interactive Entertainment (later renamed Avalon Interactive) was the video game publishing division of British conglomerate the Virgin Group. It developed and published games for major platforms and employed developers, including Westwo ...

. With Hasbro's game experience, video games seemed like a natural extension of the company and a good opportunity for revenue growth. Hasbro Interactive's objective was to develop and publish games based on Hasbro properties. In January 1997, the company announced they would publish games for the

PlayStation is a video gaming brand that consists of five home video game consoles, two handhelds, a media center, and a smartphone, as well as an online service and multiple magazines. The brand is produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment, a di ...

Strong growth (1997–1999)

In 1997, revenues increased 145% going from US$35 million to $86 million.Hasbro Interactive
from

Tuck School of Business The Tuck School of Business (also known as Tuck, and formally known as the Amos Tuck School of Administration and Finance) is the graduate business school of Dartmouth College, a private research university in Hanover, New Hampshire. Founde ...

(

PDF Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...

) Hasbro Interactive was growing so fast that there was talk of reaching $1 billion in revenues by 2002. and began to engage in some other video game licensing, such as licensing ''

Frogger is a 1981 arcade action game developed by Konami and manufactured by Sega. In North America, it was released by Sega/Gremlin. The object of the game is to direct a series of frogs to their homes by crossing a busy road and a hazardous rive ...

'' from

Konami , is a Japanese multinational video game and entertainment company headquartered in Chūō, Tokyo, it also produces and distributes trading cards, anime, tokusatsu, pachinko machines, slot machines, and arcade cabinets. Konami has ca ...

. They sought to use Hasbro

board game Board games are tabletop games that typically use . These pieces are moved or placed on a pre-marked board (playing surface) and often include elements of table, card, role-playing, and miniatures games as well. Many board games feature a co ...

brands and

Wizards of the Coast Wizards of the Coast LLC (often referred to as WotC or simply Wizards) is an American publisher of games, primarily based on fantasy and science fiction themes, and formerly an operator of retail stores for games. It is currently a subsidia ...

properties as leverage to increase revenues. Hasbro Interactive embarked on both internal and external development, and acquired some smaller video game developers and publishers along the way. On February 23, 1998, JTS sold the

Atari Atari () is a brand name that has been owned by several entities since its inception in 1972. It is currently owned by French publisher Atari SA through a subsidiary named Atari Interactive. The original Atari, Inc., founded in Sunnyvale, Ca ...

brand name and interlecial properties of

Atari Corporation Atari Corporation was an American manufacturer of computers and video game consoles. It was founded by Jack Tramiel on May 17, 1984, as Tramel Technology, Ltd., but then took on the Atari name less than two months later when Warner Communica ...

to HIAC XI, Corp., a wholly owned subsidiary created in Delaware for the purpose of the purchase. Hasbro Interactive then renamed HIAC XI, Corp. as Atari Interactive, Inc. in May 1998 and would use the Atari brand name to publish retro-themed

remake A remake is a film, television series, video game, song or similar form of entertainment that is based upon and retells the story of an earlier production in the same medium—e.g., a "new version of an existing film". A remake tells the sam ...

titles. On the 21st of that month, Hasbro announced that a

of ''Centipede'' would be released for the PC and

. Throughout 1999 and 2000, games like ''

The Next Tetris This is a list of variants of the game ''Tetris''. It includes officially licensed ''Tetris'' sequels, as well as unofficial clones. Official games {, class="sortable wikitable" , - ! Title ! Year ! Platform ! Publisher ! class = "unsortab ...

'', ''

Missile Command ''Missile Command'' is a 1980 shoot 'em up arcade video game developed and published by Atari, Inc. and licensed to Sega for Japanese and European releases. It was designed by Dave Theurer, who also designed Atari's vector graphics game '' Temp ...

'', '' Pong: The Next Level'', ''

Q*Bert ''Q*bert'' (also known as ''Qbert'') is an arcade video game developed and published for the North American market by Gottlieb in 1982. It is a Video game graphics, 2D action game with Puzzle video game, puzzle elements that uses Isometric video ...

'', '' Glover'', ''

Nerf Arena Blast ''Nerf Arena Blast'' (known as ''Nerf Arena'' in Europe) is a first-person shooter developed by Visionary Media, Inc. and published by Hasbro Interactive, released under their Atari Interactive label. The game, based on Nerf, was touted as a "fa ...

'' and '' Breakout'' would be released under the Atari branding. On August 4, 1998, the company acquired the rights for 300 games when they purchased

Avalon Hill Avalon Hill Games Inc. is a game company that publishes wargames and strategic board games. It has also published miniature wargaming rules, role-playing games and sports simulations. It is a subsidiary of Hasbro, and operates under the company' ...

for $6 million,"The Fall of Avalon Hill"
from the Academic Gaming Review and followed this up on August 14th by purchasing

MicroProse MicroProse is an American video game publisher and developer founded by Bill Stealey, Sid Meier, and Andy Hollis in 1982. It developed and published numerous games, including starting the ''Civilization'' and '' X-COM'' series. Most of their in ...

for $70 million. With those acquisitions Hasbro Interactive revenues increased 127% in 1998 to $196 million and profits of $23 million. In July 1999, the company purchased UK-based educational software publisher

Europress Europress was a British magazine and software publisher based in Adlington, near Macclesfield, Cheshire. Their magazine publishing business was previously known as Database Publications. The software division was renamed in 1999 to Actualize. His ...

. In 1998, Hasbro signed an agreement with

Majesco Sales Majesco Entertainment Company (formerly Majesco Sales Inc.) is an American video game publisher and distributor based in Hazlet, New Jersey. The company was founded as Majesco Sales in Edison, New Jersey in 1986, and was a privately held company ...

, whereas Majesco would publish/distribute games under a licensing agreement for various Nintendo consoles, notably the

Game Boy Color The (commonly abbreviated as GBC) is a handheld game console, manufactured by Nintendo, which was released in Japan on October 21, 1998 and to international markets that November. It is the successor to the Game Boy and is part of the Game ...

. Majesco and Hasbro also worked on the

Sega Dreamcast The is a home video game console released by Sega on November 27, 1998, in Japan; September 9, 1999, in North America; and October 14, 1999, in Europe. It was the first sixth-generation video game console, preceding Sony's PlayStation 2, Nint ...

adaptation of ''

Q*bert ''Q*bert'' (also known as ''Qbert'') is an arcade video game developed and published for the North American market by Gottlieb in 1982. It is a Video game graphics, 2D action game with Puzzle video game, puzzle elements that uses Isometric video ...

''.

Losses and dot-com bubble burst (1999–2000)

Hasbro Interactive became the number 3 video game publisher within three years of its founding. But in 1999, Hasbro Interactive lost $74 million on revenues of $237 million a growth of just 20% over the previous year. Late in 1999 with several game projects underway and dozens of new

employee Employment is a relationship between two parties regulating the provision of paid labour services. Usually based on a contract, one party, the employer, which might be a corporation, a not-for-profit organization, a co-operative, or any ot ...

s, many of whom moved just to work for the company, Hasbro Interactive shut down several studios in a cost-cutting move. The studios affected included the former MicroProse offices located in

Alameda, California Alameda ( ; ; Spanish for " tree-lined path") is a city in Alameda County, California, located in the East Bay region of the Bay Area. The city is primarily located on Alameda Island, but also spans Bay Farm Island and Coast Guard Island, as we ...

, and

Chapel Hill, North Carolina Chapel Hill is a town in Orange, Durham and Chatham counties in the U.S. state of North Carolina. Its population was 61,960 in the 2020 census, making Chapel Hill the 17th-largest municipality in the state. Chapel Hill, Durham, and the state ...

. A game development company,

Vicious Cycle Software Vicious Cycle Software was an American video game development company based in Morrisville, North Carolina. History Vicious Cycle was founded in 2000 by Eric Peterson, Dave Ellis, Marc Racine and Wayne Harvey after layoffs at the local Micro ...

, was started by employees laid off in the

North Carolina North Carolina () is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. The state is the List of U.S. states and territories by area, 28th largest and List of states and territories of the United ...

Hasbro Interactive studio closing. In 4 years, Hasbro Interactive's revenue increased 577%. By the middle of 2000, the

dot-com bubble The dot-com bubble (dot-com boom, tech bubble, or the Internet bubble) was a stock market bubble in the late 1990s, a period of massive growth in the use and adoption of the Internet. Between 1995 and its peak in March 2000, the Nasdaq Comp ...

had burst, Hasbro share price had lost 70% of its value in just over a year and Hasbro would post a net loss the first time in two decades.

Sale to Infogrames (2000–2001)

Faced with these difficulties, on December 6, 2000, Hasbro announced they would completely sell off their Hasbro Interactive division to French software company

. The sale included nearly all of their video game related rights and properties, the Atari brand and Hasbro's Games.com division, developer MicroProse and all of its software titles up to that point except for the Avalon Hill property. Hasbro Interactive's sale price was $100 million, $95 million as 4.5 million common shares of Infogrames and $5 million in cash. Under the terms of the sale agreement, Infogrames gained the rights to develop games based on Hasbro properties for a period of 15 years plus an option for an additional 5 years based on performance.Infogrames Entertainment to Acquire Hasbro Interactive and Games.com
press release archive from

Thomson Financial Thomson Financial was an arm of the Thomson Corporation, an information provider. When the Thomson Corporation merged with Reuters to form Thomson Reuters in April 2008, Thomson Financial was merged with the business of Reuters to form the Market ...

The deal was completed on January 29, 2001, and Hasbro Interactive, Inc. was renamed as Infogrames Interactive, Inc. Majesco had ended its relationship with Hasbro once Infogrames took over the gaming company.

Aftermath

In May 2003, the company merged with Atari Interactive, with the ex-Hasbro assets being renamed from Infogrames Interactive, Inc. to Atari Interactive, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Infogrames Entertainment, SA (IESA).Summary of Atari Inc.
from

Yahoo! Finance Yahoo! Finance is a media property that is part of the Yahoo! network. It provides financial news, data and commentary including stock quotes, press releases, financial reports, and original content. It also offers some online tools for perso ...

Infogrames (itself now known as

Atari, SA Atari SA (formerly Infogrames Entertainment SA) is a French video game holding company headquartered in Paris. Its subsidiaries include Atari Interactive and Atari, Inc. It is the current owner of the Atari brand through Atari Interactive. B ...

) still maintains ownership of the original Atari properties received through Hasbro which are kept in their Hasbro Interactive-originated placeholder, Atari Interactive, Inc. On June 9, 2005, Hasbro bought back the digital gaming rights for their properties from IESA for $65 million. Within the deal, Hasbro purchased back the video game rights to ''

Transformers ''Transformers'' is a media franchise produced by American toy company Hasbro and Japanese toy company Takara Tomy. It primarily follows the Autobots and the Decepticons, two alien robot factions at war that can transform into other forms, ...

'', ''

My Little Pony ''My Little Pony'' (''MLP'') is a toy line and media franchise developed by American toy company Hasbro. The first toys were developed by Bonnie Zacherle, Charles Muenchinger, and Steve D'Aguanno, and were produced in 1981. The ponies feature ...

'', ''

Tonka Tonka is an American producer of toy trucks. The company is known for making steel toy models of construction type trucks and machinery. Maisto International, which makes diecast vehicles, acquired the rights to use the Tonka name in a line of ...

'', '' Magic: The Gathering'', ''

Connect Four Connect Four (also known as Connect 4, Four Up, Plot Four, Find Four, Captain's Mistress, Four in a Row, Drop Four, and Gravitrips in the Soviet Union) is a two-player connection board game, in which the players choose a color and then take tur ...

'', '' Candy Land'' and '' Playskool'', while obtaining a 10-year exclusive deal to produce video games based on ''Monopoly'', ''

'', ''Game of Life'', ''Battleship'', ''Clue'', ''

Yahtzee Yahtzee is a dice game made by Milton Bradley (a company that has since been acquired and assimilated by Hasbro). It was first marketed under the name of Yahtzee by game entrepreneur Edwin S. Lowe in 1956. The game is a development of earlier ...

'', ''Simon'', ''Risk'' and '' Boggle'', alongside an expanded separate deal with the ''

Dungeons & Dragons ''Dungeons & Dragons'' (commonly abbreviated as ''D&D'' or ''DnD'') is a fantasy tabletop role-playing game (RPG) originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. The game was first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. (TS ...

'' franchise. This ten-year deal excluding D&D was soon shortened, as on August 10, 2007, Hasbro announced they had signed a new casual game deal with

Electronic Arts Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the ...

Published games

Hasbro Interactive published over 160 games on several interactive media.Games published and developed by Hasbro Interactive
from IGN Included among them are: * '' Action Man: Operation Extreme'' —

* '' Avalon Hill's Diplomacy'' —

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for se ...

* ''

Axis & Allies ''Axis & Allies'' is a series of World War II strategy game, strategy board games. The first version was initially published in 1981 and a second edition known colloquially as ''Axis & Allies: Classic'' was published in 1984. Played on a board d ...

'' — Windows * '' B-17 Flying Fortress: The Mighty 8th'' — Windows * '' Battleship: The Classic Naval Warfare Game'' — Windows * '' Battleship: Surface Thunder'' — Windows * '' Beast Wars: Transformers'' — PlayStation, Windows,

Macintosh The Mac (known as Macintosh until 1999) is a family of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple Inc. Macs are known for their ease of use and minimalist designs, and are popular among students, creative professionals, and ...

* '' Boggle'' — Windows * ''CatDog: Quest for the Golden Hydrant'' — Windows * ''

Centipede Centipedes (from New Latin , "hundred", and Latin , " foot") are predatory arthropods belonging to the class Chilopoda (Ancient Greek , ''kheilos'', lip, and New Latin suffix , "foot", describing the forcipules) of the subphylum Myriapoda, ...

'' — Windows * '' Civilization II: Test of Time'' — Windows * '' Clue'' — Windows * '' Daytona USA 2001'' —

Dreamcast The is a home video game console released by Sega on November 27, 1998, in Japan; September 9, 1999, in North America; and October 14, 1999, in Europe. It was the first sixth-generation video game console, preceding Sony's PlayStation 2, Nint ...

* '' Falcon 4.0'' — Windows * ''

'' — Windows, PlayStation * '' Frogger 2: Swampy's Revenge'' — Windows, PlayStation, Dreamcast * '' Galaga: Destination Earth'' — Windows, PlayStation,

* '' Game of Life'' — Windows * '' Glover'' —

Nintendo 64 The (N64) is a home video game console developed by Nintendo. The successor to the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, it was released on June 23, 1996, in Japan, on September 29, 1996, in North America, and on March 1, 1997, in Europe and ...

, Windows, PlayStation * ''

Grand Prix 3 ''Grand Prix 3'' is a computer racing simulator by MicroProse, released in 2000 by Hasbro Interactive. Gameplay The game is known for featuring the 1998 Formula One season (with all drivers except Jacques Villeneuve, who is instead replaced by ...

'' — Windows * '' Grand Prix World'' - Windows * ''Grand Prix World 2'' - Windows * '' Gunship!'' — Windows * '' H.E.D.Z.'' — Windows * '' Majesty: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim'' — Windows * ''

MechWarrior 3 ''MechWarrior 3'' is a vehicle simulation game, part of the ''MechWarrior'' series. It featured a new 3D accelerated graphics engine at the time of its release. The game contains over 20 missions, with access to 18 different Battlemech, mechs. A n ...

'' — Windows * ''

Jeopardy! ''Jeopardy!'' is an American game show created by Merv Griffin. The show is a quiz competition that reverses the traditional question-and-answer format of many quiz shows. Rather than being given questions, contestants are instead given genera ...

'' — PlayStation, Windows * ''

'' (1995) - Windows * ''

'' (1997) — PlayStation * ''

Monopoly Star Wars ''Monopoly Star Wars'' is the 1997 Monopoly franchise Star Wars video game based on the board game and set in the Star Wars fictional universe. It is one of many ''Monopoly'' video game adaptions. The game was developed by Artech Studios and publ ...

'' — Windows * ''

'' (1999) — Nintendo 64 * ''

'' (1999) — Windows * '' NASCAR Heat'' — Windows, PlayStation,

* ''

NASCAR Racers ''NASCAR Racers'' is an animated television series by Saban Entertainment which features two rival NASCAR racing teams, Team Fastex and Team Rexcor, competing against each other in the futuristic NASCAR Unlimited Division. The series ran from 199 ...

'' — Windows, Game Boy Color * ''

'' — Windows * ''Nerf Jr. Foam Blaster: Attack of the Kleptons!'' — Windows * ''

Nicktoons Racing ''Nicktoons Racing'' is a Nickelodeon crossover racing video game. The game was first developed by Pipe Dream and released for the Game Boy Color, while versions for different platforms were released in subsequent years. Most versions were devel ...

'' — Windows, PlayStation, Game Boy Color * '' Pac-Man: Adventures in Time'' — Windows * '' Pong: The Next Level'' — Windows, PlayStation * ''

'' — Windows, PlayStation, Dreamcast, Game Boy Color * ''

Risk In simple terms, risk is the possibility of something bad happening. Risk involves uncertainty about the effects/implications of an activity with respect to something that humans value (such as health, well-being, wealth, property or the environm ...

'' — Windows * ''

Risk II ''Risk II'' is a video game version of the board game '' Risk'', developed by Deep Red Games and published by Hasbro Interactive under the MicroProse label. It's a sequel to the 1996 version of ''Risk''. In addition to the classic board game s ...

'' — Windows * ''

RollerCoaster Tycoon ''RollerCoaster Tycoon'' is a series of simulation video games about building and managing an amusement park. Each game in the series challenges players with open-ended amusement park management and development, and allowing players to construc ...

'' — Windows * '' Rubik's Games'' — Windows * ''

'' — Windows (''MacScrabble'' — Macintosh) * '' Sorry!'' — Windows * '' Spirit of Speed 1937'' — Windows * '' Star Trek: Birth of the Federation'' — Windows * '' Trivial Pursuit Millennium'' — Windows * ''

Wheel of Fortune The Wheel of Fortune or '' Rota Fortunae'' has been a concept and metaphor since ancient times referring to the capricious nature of Fate. Wheel of Fortune may also refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Art * ''The Wheel of Fortune'' (Burne-J ...

'' — PlayStation, Windows * '' Worms Armageddon'' — Windows, Dreamcast, PlayStation * '' X-COM: Enforcer'' — Windows * ''

'' — Windows

References

External links

''Hasbro Interactive'' History
at

MobyGames MobyGames is a commercial website that catalogs information on video games and the people and companies behind them via crowdsourcing. This includes nearly 300,000 games for hundreds of platforms. The site is supported by banner ads and a small ...

Hasbro Interactive
by William Achtmeyer from

(

) {{Authority control 1995 establishments in Massachusetts 2001 disestablishments in Massachusetts Companies based in Beverly, Massachusetts Former Hasbro subsidiaries Defunct video game companies of the United States Video game companies established in 1995 Video game companies disestablished in 2001 American companies established in 1995 American companies disestablished in 2001