"I want to do something else." RyanAshleyBrant said sitting on the sofa of his father's company-even though he can make money lying down now. "I want to do something more like young people, such as science and technology."
Brent's father, Peter Brant, was already a billionaire at that time. His son naturally had to help him start a business. Together with other investors, on September 3, 1993, Brent was registered in Delaware with $1.5 million in cash and named Take-two. Young Brent probably never imagined that this name would set off a storm in the game industry in a few years.
Rich in family wealth, traveling with the wind
Although Brandt has just entered the game industry, his rich family background and vicious businessman's eyes made him win the first pot of gold the following year. In 1994, the game industry was in a booming stage, and people were curious about this new entertainment mode, especially the dynamic video game played by real actors was the most popular. For example, Take-two's self-developed debut "Hell:ACyberpunkThriller" sold 3, copies in half a year. Then Take-two released Ripper with a similar theme in 1996. Although the sales volume was only half of the former, it still brought considerable profits to the company.
Brandt, who has tasted the sweetness, is gradually dissatisfied with the development work. Because he has published books before, he also wants to try a similar business in the game industry. However, at that time, Take-two's scale was not enough to undertake its game distribution business. In order to further expand, Brandt decided to go public in April 1997, and raised about 1 million US dollars at the opening price of 5.5 US dollars. Brandt, with sufficient funds, quickly started the acquisition process. First, GameTek, which was previously released for his own game, was included in his backhand, along with a large number of classic game IPS. Then it acquired three video game distribution companies to expand its influence in the retail market.
of course, compared with the acquisition of Take-two, this action is just a small test.
* Anecdote: Peter's sister IreneBrantZelinsky has a childhood playmate named DonaldJ.Trump
unruly, rock star
In 1997, Take-two released a work called MonkeyHero. Although the response of this work was mediocre, Take-two got to know the game company BMGEntertainment, which released a work called GrandTheftAuto in Europe in November of the same year. Although this book was a great commercial success at that time, it was also criticized by the media and the government, and it first attracted social attention to the violent elements in video games.
for Brent, controversy is not necessarily a bad thing-from the perspective of acquisition. In the following three years, Take-two wholly acquired BMGInteractive, the distribution company of BMGEntertainment, for US$ 14.2 million, thus obtaining the North American distribution right of GTA. What followed was the criticism of the American government and the media. Congressman JoeLieberman strongly opposed the distribution of this book in the United States. Although the ESRB game grading system was established in the United States in 1994, GTA is the first game work with violence as its core, and even ESRB feels extremely difficult, thus kicking off a 2-year war of words between GTA series and the US government.
Of course, players are not as worried as the government. They have already heard about the wave of GTA in Europe, and now they are waiting for the game to be released. Take-two, who was well aware of this, pushed through the crowd and released GTA in North America in March 1998, with sales exceeding 1.5 million copies, becoming Take-two's best-selling game work at that time. At the same time, in the name of acquisition, Take-two also contacted the Hauser brothers (DanielHouser and SamHouser) who worked at BMGInteractive at that time, and in the near future, they will completely change Take-two's historical position.
The huge profits brought by Grand Theft Auto further accelerated Take-two's acquisition. In August 1998, Take-Two acquired American game dealer JackofAllGames for about 16.8 million dollars, which opened up offline sales channels all over the United States. In 1999, Take-Two acquired DMADesign*, the production company of Grand Theft Auto, invested in a large number of game studios headed by Bungie, acquired several game publishers and distributors, and gradually opened up the global market.
* Interesting talk: After Take-two completed the acquisition, DMA originally planned to launch GTA3D and GrandtheFTAuto: OnlineCrimeworld. However, due to the huge turnover of personnel just after the acquisition, GTA3 was finally made with the help of Rockstar and Take-two, and then it was integrated into R star. It was renamed as the well-known RockstarNorth
coffee bomb, and smoke was everywhere
In February p>21, Brandt resigned as CEO of Take-two and took the post of chairman, and was replaced by Sumner. At the same time, the newly-established Rockstar Studio of Hauser Brothers has been reported frequently. In 21, GTA3 was released, GTA: Sin City was released in 22, and GTA: San Andreas was released in 24, which accumulated more than 1 billion dollars for Take-two, and enabled the latter to win the copyright of civilization series from Infogrames Company at the cost of 22.3 million dollars in 24.
In 25, Take-two spent more than US$ 8 million to acquire game developers, the most expensive of which was to buy Sega's VisualConcepts and KushGames, two studios focusing on sports games, for US$ 32 million. The latter was mainly responsible for baseball-themed works and eventually closed down in 28. The former has been further expanded, and now they are responsible for the new year sports games, NBA2K and WWE2K.
Because there are so many studios acquired, just one day after the acquisition, Take-two announced the establishment of a game brand 2K, integrating all its studios, and then acquired FiraxisGames, the developer of Civilization series, and IrrationalGames, the developer of bioshock. The number of studios has exceeded double digits.
Rockstar's amazing performance as a deity made Take-two have unlimited scenery and earned a lot of money. But what Take-two doesn't know is that this so-called angel will soon open his huge mouth and drag himself into the abyss.
At the same time as Take-two made this series of acquisitions, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) began to examine Take-Two's business records. According to the lawsuit filed in 21, Take-Two's income seems to be inconsistent with the game sales figures reported by NPDGroup (an American market research company), and it was finally identified as a fraud involving 6 million US dollars. Take-two was closely observed for five years, until after the SEC issued a complaint in 25, Take-Two agreed to pay a fine of $7.5 million, and Brent and other senior executives also paid a total fine of about $6.4 million. Brent officially left the company the following year.
Although market research has made Take-two suffer, it is nothing compared with the upcoming "coffee bomb".
in p>24, Rockstar officially released GTA: San Andreas, which achieved unprecedented success in the world. But the players at that time didn't know that R star had hidden a string of mysterious codes under the surface of the game world.
In the process of developing San Andreas, game director Sam Hauser asked designers to add a little game in which players make out with their girlfriends, and named it "coffee" (in English slang, it refers to sexual behavior between men and women). After the development, JenniferKolbe, director of operations of Rockstar, warned that explicit pornographic content may cause the rating committee to make a restrictive rating, which will prohibit or restrict its sales in some countries/regions, while retailers in most other countries/regions may prohibit its sales, and any result will seriously damage sales. However, as an open-world game in San Andreas, the logic between the codes is too complicated, and it is difficult to separate and delete the "coffee", so R Star simply added a layer of cutscenes to hide the content on the basis of the original small game, and then it was officially released.
Because the PS2 version was originally released, "Coffee" was discovered by data miners, but it could not be restored to the game. It was not until June 25, two days after the PC version was released, that ModderPatrickWildenborg released a patch that could unlock the "Coffee" mini-game in the game and named it "Hot Coffee" *.
A stone stirs up a thousand waves. Players may only smile at this little game, but it is a godsend opportunity for the covetous government. Within a month, the American Entertainment Software Classification Board (ESRB) and the Australian Film and Literature Classification Office (OFLC) re-evaluated the content classification of San Andreas. The former upgraded the original "M" level to "AO", making it the first and only GTA series released on a large scale in North America, and a large number of offline sales channels removed it from the shelves. The latter was changed from the original "MA15+" to "refuse to classify" and completely banned from being sold in Australia. R Star and Take-two had to stop selling the current version of the game immediately, and at the same time spent about $24 million to recycle the offline retail version. After several months of revision, they were put back on the shelves and restored to their original ratings.
at the same time, the U.S. senator headed by HillaryClinton suggested re-enacting the sales regulations of video games, and asked the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to investigate whether Star R intentionally sabotaged ESRB by including content in the game. The investigation lasted for one year, and it was not until June 26 that the two sides reached a settlement. Judging from the results, R star was not punished, but was warned that if he still didn't specify the content of grading in the game introduction next time, he would face a fine of up to $11,. However, Star R won't forget the aggressive Hillary easily. They replaced the face of the Statue of Liberty with Hillary's appearance in the later GTA4, and replaced the original torch with a cup of hot coffee to satirize the latter.
in addition to government investigations, some social activists are also preparing to take advantage of the fire to rob. In new york, FlorenceCohen initiated a class action lawsuit against Star R, an 85-year-old woman who just bought this game with the rating of "M" for her 14-year-old grandson-although the rules clearly state that "M" is suitable for consumers over 17 years old. Cohen's lawsuit claims that RockstarGames and game publisher Take-two are guilty of cheating, false advertising, fraud and abuse. The accusation of fraud is based on the change of rating from "M" to "AO", which means that the original rating is a kind of cheating. The case was settled out of court in 27, but then in 28, the lawyer TedFrank objected to the settlement, because the collective members who initiated the lawsuit did not pay the lawyer's fee of 1 million yuan. At that time, only 2,7 people responded to the class action lawsuit initiated by millions of people, so the case went away. Coupled with the lawsuit initiated by the city of Los Angeles that the game did not disclose pornographic content immediately, as of 29, Take-two settled the class action lawsuit related to the game dispute and retrospective charges for more than 2 million dollars, temporarily ending this farce.
* Anecdote: In February, 22, a user recreated a similar "hot coffee" MOD for RedDeadRedemption2 of Rockstar, which involved the game protagonist Arthur Morgan having sex with prostitutes. Take-two has sent a stop letter to the MODule maker, claiming that the MODule violates the terms of use of the game, but the mod maker argues that the mod "will not enable anything previously hidden by the developer, and only uses the audio in the game".
domestic troubles and foreign invasion, so as to invade
in p>26, a fire destroyed a part of Take-two headquarters building in new york. In early January, 27, Take-two moved its 2K headquarters to the HamiltonLanding office park in Nobato, California, covering an area of 65, square feet. At that time, Take-two was under siege, and the SEC investigation was still going on. A series of follow-up incidents caused by "hot coffee" emerged one after another, and the company's income also fell to the bottom, with a loss of $16 million in 26. On the whole, the investors of Take-Two discussed the possibility of taking over the company at the board meeting in March 27, so as to expel the current management of the company and let Zelnik of ZelnickMedia as the chairman of the board, who was the president and CEO of BMG North America. At the beginning, he was very opposed to selling BMGInteractive to Take-two. Later, he served as the chief operating officer of 2th Century Fox and the CEO of Crystal Dynamics. In 21, he founded ZelnickMedia, a private equity company focusing on media and interactive entertainment investment.
after failing to find other buyers, the shareholders agreed to the acquisition plan, and BenFeder, a partner of Zelnik, became the CEO. After the acquisition, they reorganized Take-two's corporate structure, fired 5% to 15% of the 2,1 employees, re-evaluated the company's various businesses, and began to look for buyers for its distribution departments, and decided to withdraw from the distribution market.
in February, 28, EA proposed to acquire Take-two* at a price of $25 per share, with a total price of about $1.9 billion. After being rejected once, it was revised to $26 per share. At that time, the share value of Take-two was about $1 per share. John, CEO of EA