Fallout IP Completely Sold To Bethesda, For $5.75 Million

"Yes, now there truly is no one else to blame", agrees Bethsoft's senior executive producer, Ashley Cheng, in the aftermath of last week's surprise announcement that Interplay has completely sold the Fallout intellectual property, trade mark and assets to Bethesda Software, for no less than $5.75 million! That's almost five times the price they initially paid for licensing the franchise in order to develop Fallout 3, back in July 2004. So we can only hope the game will be good enough to merit just as many sequels... (yeah, right!)

Snapping back to reality, the news spread like radioactive fallout after a blog spotted this 8-K report filed by Interplay, revealing that as of April 9, Bethesda is the sole owner of the Fallout IP. The only thing still retained by Interplay is the license to develop the previously announced Fallout MMO game, but under several conditions.

1. Interplay agrees to begin full-scale development of its Fallout MMOG within 24 months of the agreement

2. Interplay agrees to raise at least $30 million in financing for the Fallout MMOG within that time frame

3. Interplay must also commercially launch the Fallout MMOG within 4 years of its development commencement date (meaning no later than April 2012, assuming they take a full year to begin development)

Should Interplay fail to comply with any of these conditions (and odds are they will), they will lose their license rights for the MMO. But, of course, Herve Caen gets to keep his dirty money. (Oh my god, he killed Black Isle. That bastard!)

On the other hand, should Interplay comply with Bethesda's quality standards and successfully launch the Fallout MMO (as in having a minimum of 10,000 paying subscribers), Bethesda will receive 12% of all revenues generated by the game. I, for one, would be happy enough if they manage to keep the franchise alive for that long. Or in other words, Fallout 3 better not suck, Bethsoft. It better not suck!

(N.B. Archive text, links removed)