THQ and Adidas Settle Lawsuit

[Andy Chalk]

THQ and Adidas Settle Lawsuit

THQ and Adidas have settled their $10 million dispute over the fitness game miCoach 24/7.

Athletic apparel company Adidas miCoach [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/116143-Adidas-Sues-THQ], an "interactive personal coaching and training system." miCoach 24/7, as it was called, was intended to come out in January of this year but the publisher informed Adidas in December 2011 that it wasn't going to happen.

Adidas filed suit, demanding more than $10 million in damages and an order that THQ not sell or transfer the rights of the game to anyone else, since it was apparently reluctant to give it up to Adidas' replacement developer of choice. For a struggling company like THQ, whose share price continues to flounder well below the minimum $1 mark needed to avoid NASDAQ delisting [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/115591-THQ-Faces-NASDAQ-Delisting], ten million bucks is a lot of scratch. Fortunately, the problem seems to have been resolved to everyone's satisfaction.

"Adidas and THQ Inc. have amicably resolved the dispute, which will allow Adidas to get the miCoach game to market without delay and without compromising any of its unique features," Adidas rep Frank Thomas told Gamesta [http://www.gamesta.com/thq-not-publishing-micoach-game-reached-settlement-with-adidas/]. "Through the settlement, each party was recognized for and compensated for their important contributions to the game."

Details of the settlement weren't revealed but a THQ rep confirmed that the company will not be publishing the game. Adidas presumably has someone else lined up to publish miCoach 24/7, while THQ is likely just happy to have disentangled itself without suffering any heavy financial body blows.

via: Joystiq [http://www.joystiq.com/2012/03/28/thq-and-adidas-settle-micoach-lawsuit]


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[Therumancer]

The way this sounds to me given that they say "both parties have been compensated" and how Addidas is going to get the game to market without delay, leads me to believe that THQ actually did a lot of work on the project, and Addidas owed them some kind of compensation, and was trying to get them to put the product on the market before they received it, probably in an effort to avoid paying THQ until they saw how well it actually performed.

That's wild speculation, and does make me wonder why if THQ was owed compensation of some sort here (as well as Addidas) why they were concered about THQ passing the liscence on to someone else.

That said looking at some of the apps out there like "Templar Assault" I've kind of wondered why THQ hasn't tried to use it's Warhammer 40k liscence to produce a few apps in a similar vein with the official liscence if it's so desperate for money. Turn based strategy games and strategy RPGs actually work pretty well on tablet type devices. Of course they might have alreasdy done this and they just aren't on my "Kindle: Fire". Truthfully given that Warhammer and 40k are based on turn based minatures games, I've wondered why it seems that all the games involving those franchises wind up being some variety of real time game. The Warhammer rules are complicated, but not utterly terrible, and truthfully I'd think there would be a market for a literal computer translation of the games and play style.

 

[Azmael Silverlance]

THQ is struggling? How come

 

[80Maxwell08]

THQ is struggling? How come

Wasting tons of money on the uDraw and marketing for Homefront I assume. They managed to drive their stock prices down from $34 to half a dollar and are now trying to get it above a dollar before they get removed the stock listings.

 

[robert022614]

Well it will probably bode better for THQ to get as far away from this fail in the making anyway.

 

[Andy Chalk]

THQ is struggling? How come

Wasting tons of money on the uDraw and marketing for Homefront I assume. They managed to drive their stock prices down from $34 to half a dollar and are now trying to get it above a dollar before they get removed the stock listings.

Actually, the biggest problem at THQ appears to be that the company continued to throw away truckloads of money on licensing rights for various IPs (movies, tv shows) that nobody cared about long after the rest of the world figured out that that's a losing strategy. All the Disney/Pixar games, the Spongebob games, The Biggest Loser, Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?, all of that garbage and more cost THQ big bucks for license rights and - big surprise! - doesn't sell for shit. THQ announced in January that it was getting out of the licensed IP business to focus on "core franchises" but at this point that's just bailing the Titanic.

uDraw, as you mentioned, was another huge factor. THQ invested heavily into it, pretty much bet the farm on it going big, and it tanked badly. I think uDraw was THQ's last, best hope at pulling out of a nosedive before things got really ugly (layoffs, cancellations, salary cuts, etc.) and it didn't just fail to get the job done, it made thing substantially worse.

I don't think Homefront is part of the problem. It wasn't a huge hit but I think it more or less broke even, maybe made a little money, and at this stage, "didn't cause more damage" is a pretty big positive. There's still a chance to spin it into a winner. But for now, the only sure-fire winner THQ has on its hands is Saints Row, and even that's a mid-range franchise at best. So, yeah. Tough spot to be in.

 

[Weaver]

But for now, the only sure-fire winner THQ has on its hands is Saints Row, and even that's a mid-range franchise at best. So, yeah. Tough spot to be in.

They also have Relic which seems to consistently put out a quality product. Though space marine was hardly my favourite offering from the company. I really hope their choices to abandon licensing IPs will lead to Relic's freedom from the 40k franchise. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE the 40k games, but Relic is an immensely talented PC developer, especially when it comes to strategy games. I'd love to see them let off the leash to do their own thing.

Darksiders was also generally favourably received (critically, and I think in sales as well) and if they can keep pushing the IP it could be a good selling franchise for them. Yes, the game ripped everything (and I mean everything) off from somewhere else, but I enjoyed playing it.

 

[Lionsfan]

Cool I guess? I don't know where Adidas think this game is going to go though, it's a neat idea but probably will be like the WiiFit board