Disney open to more collaborations with Eidos Montreal and Crystal Dynamics

Despite the commercial failure of Avengers and Guardians of the Galaxy, Disney is still open to future collaborations with Eidos Montreal and Crystal Dynamics.

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Years ago, Japanese games publisher Square Enix made a surprise announcement: It was working on two games set in the Marvel universe, and its Deus Ex and Tomb Raider teams were leading production. One was a live service game based on the Avengers, which ultimately flopped, and the other was an excellent singleplayer Guardians of the Galaxy game that also "failed to meet expectations."

Back-to-back sales misses led to significant losses, prompting Square Enix to sell its entire Western games division including the devs of the Avengers and Guardians of the Galaxy games, Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal. The Embracer Group snapped up these studios in a landmark $300 million deal, and Eidos is currently making a new Tomb Raider game with Crystal Dynamics believed to be returning to Deus Ex.

But what about more Marvel games? Maybe a Star Wars project?

Sean Shoptaw, the Senior Vice President, Global Games & Interactive Experiences at Disney, says he's open to working with both of these studios again on future projects.

"We would go back and work with those studios again. They're great studios, great partners," Shoptaw told Axios' Stephen Totilo.

Shoptaw goes on to highlight the importance of Disney's third-party approach to games, and why publishing partners are so important: "Games are really hard to make. If you've got great IP. If you've got a great story. You know, it's still a challenge."

Disney's gaming lineup has drastically expanded over the years with a multitude of new projects in development, including:

EA

• Iron Man - EA Motive
• Black Panther - Cliffhanger Games
• New Star Wars RTS - Respawn & Bit Reactor
• Star Wars FPS - Respawn
• Jedi 3?

Ubisoft

• Star Wars Outlaws - Massive Entertainment

Quantic Dream

• Star Wars Eclipse

Skydance

• WW2 ensemble game with Captain America - Skydance New Media, led by Uncharted's Amy Hennig
• Star Wars project - Skydance New Media, led byDominic Robilliard (Star Wars 1313)

Bethesda Softworks

• Blade - Arkane Lyon
• Indiana Jones - MachineGames