Video game rental subscription service GameFly on Wednesday said it would acquire IGN Entertainment's game download storefront Direct2Drive.The acquisition expands GameFly's scope beyond disc-based console video games, putting the company in charge of a popular digital storefront that hosts 3,000 Mac and PC games.
As part of the deal, IGN will gain a minority stake in GameFly, although IGN "will play no direct role in GameFly's operations or governance," according to a press statement. News Corp. will also take an observer seat on GameFly's board. The parties did not reveal terms of the agreement.
Among IGN Entertainment's brands, Direct2Drive was a bit of an oddball -- a digital distribution business amid entertainment websites such as IGN.com, GameSpy, FilePlanet, TeamXbox and AskMen...the leading online video game rental subscription service, today announced the acquisition of IGN Entertainment's Direct2Drive.com (D2D), a leader in digital distribution of video games. D2D, the popular digital retailer, will continue providing more than 3,000 PC and Mac titles for gamers to purchase and download digitally...GameFly, the leading online video game rental subscription service, allows subscribers to rent one or more video games concurrently, with no due dates, late fees or shipping charges for a fixed monthly fee starting at $15.95 a month. Subscribers select titles and manage their GameQ online from the GameFly website at www.gamefly.com or from its GameFly mobile application for iOS, Android and Palm devices. Users receive games via First-Class Mail and return them to GameFly at their convenience using prepaid mailers. In addition to selling video games through the "Keep" feature, GameFly also sells new and used video games to subscribers and others through the website.
Shacknews parent company GameFly announced that it has acquired PC game digital distributor Direct2Drive from IGN Entertainment. The deal adds D2D's library of over 3,000 PC and Mac titles available for purchase and download digitally to the extensive list of video games available for rent from the GameFly's subscription service.
GameFly chief executive officer Dave Hodess told Shacknews that for the immediate future there will be no changes to either service. Though down the line, customers of both services can expect to see some new options.
"We have some ideas but need to get the D2D team onboard and benefit from their experience. We will let our customers know as soon as we are ready to roll them out," Hodess said. Though he didn't commit to any sort of hard timetable, Hodess did say that he expected six months would be a fair estimate of when the first changes might start to be seen.
As for why GameFly looked to add D2D to the company, Hodess explained that the company knows its console game subscribers are heavy PC gamers as well, so offering a combination of the two makes a lot of sense. As for whether adding D2D was a prelude to offering PC games for rental as well, Hodess said "We know that consumers are interested in PC game rentals, so we will investigate this idea thoroughly."..Also, neither Gamefly nor Direct2Drive offers game-streaming services, like those of cloud-gaming companies OnLive and Gaikai, so for the moment the Netflix analogy only goes so far. Providing some rationale for the deal, GameFly CEO Dave Hodess told ShackNews, "We know that consumers are interested in PC game rentals, so we will investigate this idea thoroughly."
The terms of the deal have not been disclosed. A GameFly press release (PDF) indicated that IGN will retain a minority equity stake in GameFly, and News Corp. will take an observer seat on GameFly's board of directors.
download gamefly, game fly, game rentals online, download gamefly review, blockbuster download, games for rent download, playstation 3 games
No comments:
Post a Comment