WB Play: Is Warner Bros. Secretly Developing a Steam Competitor?

[Josh Engen]

WB Play: Is Warner Bros. Secretly Developing a Steam Competitor?

Is Warner Bros. preparing to go head to head with Steam and Origin?

Something is brewing over at Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. The publisher behind Batman: Arkham Origins, Injustice: Gods Among Us, Mortal Kombat, and a practically never-ending list of other titles might be preparing to launch its own distribution platform.

Last month, Warner Bros. filed a series of trademark applications for something called "WB Play." The filings cover things like "online retail store services," "audio and video broadcasting services," and "entertainment service." But the centerpiece of Warner's trademark goulash is the "downloadable virtual goods" application.

Here's what the trademark covers: "Downloadable virtual goods; downloadable electronic strategy and instructional guides for computer and video games; computer game software; video game software; audio and video recordings in the fields of computer and video games; downloadable multimedia files containing artwork, text, audio, video, games, and Internet Web links relating to computer and video"

Until now, Warner Bros. has always relied on platforms like Origin [http://store.steampowered.com/] to distribute its games, but all of that could change very soon. In fact, there's a good chance that it'll launch before the end of the month.

Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor is set to launch on September 30th, and the game's website has already been slyly branded with the WB Play logo (check out the upper left-hand corner [https://www.shadowofmordor.com/agegate/]). Obviously, we don't know if WB Play will become the exclusive retailer of Warner Bros. games, and Shadows of Mordor is currently available for pre-order on Steam. So, exclusivity might not be an issue.

The folks at Warner Bros. have been keeping this a secret for quite some time. The domain name wbplay.com was registered back in back in 2013, but it's currently an empty hole in the Internet.

Perhaps the most interesting application in the bunch is the document that covers "audio and video broadcasting services." Here's the description:

"Providing access to computer, electronic and online databases; audio and video broadcasting services over the internet or other communication networks; providing access to websites by enabling users to log in through a universal username and password via the internet and other communication networks"

It's hard to tell what's going on from the language, but WB Play will definitely have some kind of audio and video component. Warner Bros. owns a record label and has billions of dollars wrapped up in its television production arm, so it wouldn't be surprising to see all of these rolled into one convenient storefront.

Again, we don't actually know how Warner Bros. intends to use these trademarks. However, the company is obviously putting together some kind of distribution platform. Though, it's hard to tell if it's a Steam-like service or some kind of online storefront.

We have reached out to Warner Bros. for a comment, and will continue to keep you updated as the story unfolds.

Source: Trademarkia [http://www.uspto.gov/trademarks/index.jsp]


Permalink

 

[Hoplon]

oh for fucks sake, what sort of diseased mind come up with this shit "it took a dedicated developer 10 years to create a good platfrom, we'll be able to do that in a week right?"

 

[Darth Sea Bass]

I sincerely hope it's not going to be another Origin/Uplay kind of thing! While Origin isn't the diseased thing it once used to be Uplay is a fucking cancer. I really don't want to sign up to multiple services just to play a game.

 

[TiberiusEsuriens]

oh for fucks sake, what sort of diseased mind come up with this shit "it took a dedicated developer 10 years to create a good platfrom, we'll be able to do that in a week right?"

I didn't see a single spot in there that mentions immediate perfection. In fact, they point out that this has been in development for years, with no release date yet.

I personally think this could be a good thing. While I don't like the idea of each publisher sectioning off their content from other marketplaces, I do like the idea of one platform containing both games, music, and movies. That sort of inclusivity could give WBPlay a good leg up once they get past the inevitable crashing, obtrusive DRM, and online vitriol. While there are already online retailers that sell all of these goods digitally, they typically just give codes for things like Steam.

This sounds like someone threw iTunes and Steam together in a room and they had a baby, which is a weird way to invision it but enticing none-the-less.

 

[sturryz]

ANOTHER place for people to have to make ANOTHER login, this is getting stupid.

 

[Aiddon_v1legacy]

It's something a lot of companies seem to want to do; they want it to be so THEIR libraries can essentially be a service onto themselves. Eventually I wouldn't be surprised if they try to put their titles on a subscription so if you want access to them you have to pay a fee, even if a lot of them don't appeal to you.

 

[joeykinney]

Please, no. Steam is fine. I already hate Uplay and Origin enough, I don't want a 3rd.

 

[weirdee]

"splintering the playerbase was a great idea the first time and everybody involved is totally not losing money from it, let's keep doing it"

 

[Evil Smurf]

Jim called it, maybe he is God?

 

[Jumwa]

I dream of a glorious future where every publisher has their own obnoxious and required distribution platform. Dozens of Uplays, Battle.nets and Origins, my hard drive cluttered with those beautiful programs. All of them calling out to launch at startup. All of them magnificently unnecessary steps between me and playing my games.

Please don't let me down Warner. Throw your shitty platform out there for gamers to (forcibly) enjoy. Make my desktop swell with more crappy icons for programs I'd never run except by sheer necessity of playing games.

 

[OldNewNewOld]

I would gladly accept this if it fulfilled only 2 conditions.
1. It will offer games from all publisher sames as Steam does
2. They won't pull their games from Steam/Origin/Other sites just to force people to use their distribution system (looking at you EA. Main reason I hate Origin)

Competition is a great thing, until it forces me to have 20 installed clients which I wouldn't use even 1 if I wasn't forced to.
Worst of all, using the same password for all clients which have my CC info saved is one of the worst things you could do which would force me to have a million passwords all of which must have at least 1 upper case, 1 number and 8 total character. No, I don't want it that way.
Be competition but compete by offering better prices and service and not by taking hostages. But we all know what will happen.

 

[Nurb]

Digital distribution seems fantastic until you have to install a half-dozen 3rd party stoftware DRM just to play games you buy.

 

[Zydrate]

I like a lot of Ubisoft games but the fact I had to sign up and launch through their shit annoys me.
I only have Origin and Uplay because I /had/ to. But Steam is the only client I load up when I start my computer up. I like looking at the new sales (Which are different on a daily basis).

 

[gigastar]

oh for fucks sake, what sort of diseased mind come up with this shit "it took a dedicated developer 10 years to create a good platfrom, we'll be able to do that in a week right?"

Yeah, even EA had the good sense to get in with Valve and see how it all worked before they replicated Steam.

I would gladly accept this if it fulfilled only 2 conditions.
1. It will offer games from all publisher sames as Steam does
2. They won't pull their games from Steam/Origin/Other sites just to force people to use their distribution system (looking at you EA. Main reason I hate Origin)

I dont really see the first happening. Since the trademarks make it sound like a platform for distributing all WB media, but with a primary focus on movies and TV, the things that make up the overwhelming majority of WBros publishing portfolio.

They certainly could carry other publishers games, but why would we go to WBros? Chances are they already publish on Steam.

And the second, well it didnt exactly win people to Origin in a hurry. It basically took Battlefield 3 to get actual PC players to Origin. WBros would probably use the trojan route Ubisoft took with uPlay.

And for the record, EA only stopped releasing new titles on Steam. I think they only pulled one game, and i dont really care enough to remember which.

 

[Hawk of the Plain]

Well it looks like I won't be bothering with future batman games (and whatever else they publish), I don't like them enough to deal with another steam clone.

(This is assuming they go the Uplay/Origin route, the possibility that it will be decent exists, but I am not optimistic)

 

[XenoScifi]

This...this is not a good sign. I already have 4 fucking platforms running why the fuck do I need yet another? Because a big company thinks so? Like somebody above said, Jim fucking called it. He is God and I do thank him for himself! Now if he could fucking do away with these platforms I'd be happy.

 

[J Tyran]

I think this is more likely to be an app or mobile store front and maybe even a windows 8+ tile app of some kind rather than a PC launcher just for games, just about everyone that makes/publishes movies/music/games seems to be determined to have a presence in the mobile sector with apps that try to funnel their content to you every possible second. If they could hook you up to an IV with a built in portable card transaction processor that charged you by the minute they would do.

So far WB doesn't have anything like that when many of the other big names like Sony do.

 

[Shayman]

My computer is just being filled up with all this third party junk, it's so frustrating...

 

[Hoplon]

And for the record, EA only stopped releasing new titles on Steam. I think they only pulled one game, and i dont really care enough to remember which.

They pulled the Dragon Age games and Mass Effect series entirely. mostly over a what feels now like an artificial DLC disagreement. Since origin seemed to launch mere moments later.

 

[FalloutJack]

Oh, this is rich. I'm sure nothing will go wrong with this.

You know...except everything.