Among Atari's woes of the past few years was the conflict with FUNimation over the rights to the Dragon Ball franchise in the U.S. Today, the door officially closed on Atari's involvement with the popular anime/manga with the announcement that Namco Bandai Games America has obtained the rights to publish Dragon Ball games in North America.
This new agreement will last five years starting in January 2010, superseding the rights of Atari on the PS3, PSP, DS, Wii and Xbox 360 platforms. Namco Bandai Games America has also been granted rights to publish three titles in 2009: Dragon Ball: Raging Blast for the Xbox 360 and PS3, Dragon Ball: Revenge of King Piccolo for Wii, and Dragon Ball Z: Attack of the Saiyans for DS.
“We are very excited to have signed this long term agreement with Toei Animation Co., Ltd and FUNimation Entertainment, which grants Namco Bandai Games North American multi-platform rights to the testosterone-driven, action-packed world of Dragon Ball," said Makoto Iwai, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer at Namco Bandai Games America. "This move reunites Namco Bandai Games with the Dragon Ball series in North America which will considerably increase our ability to develop titles that perfectly capture every nuance of what makes the Dragon Ball world exciting to the consumer.”
The ongoing popularity of Dragon Ball more than a decade after its conclusion in Japan still amazes us. With this five-year contract, and a remastered version of Dragon Ball Z airing in Japan, we'd expect the series to keep on going for years to come.
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July 3, 2009
Namco Bandai already has the rights to the series in Japan, so no big deal here. At least it means one less logo on the title screen.