Capcom Goes to Hollywood

Capcom plans to strengthen its ties to Hollywood, not just in terms of licensing its own properties for film adaptations, but also in taking on an increasing number of film and television licenses, according to a recent Hollywood Reporter piece. Last year, it was revealed that the company signed off on a new Chun-Li-focused Street Fighter film, an Onimusha movie is already known to be in development by Brotherhood of the Wolf and Silent Hill director Christophe Gans, and the existing Resident Evil film franchise is reportedly Sony Pictures' most successful property after Spider-Man. Now, with the hiring of former THQ licensing executive Germaine Gioia, who was instrumental in creating that publisher's current strong market position largely based on film and television properties, Capcom hopes to start finding opportunities in licensed game development. With much of Capcom's existing game success cointinuing to draw from its established properties skewed towards older gamers--Resident Evil, Devil May Cry, Onimusha--as well as strong new IP and some broader fare such as Mega Man, the company seems to be looking to fill market gaps in its publishing coverage by addressing an area to which it has traditionally not allocated a high number of resources. "I think it is becoming clear that the very largest successful publishers are delivering more and more of a balance to the marketplace," said Gioia. "They need (not only) their own intellectual property and good solid original development but (also) licensed product that can reach across cultures." Gioia hopes that the move will help Capcom gain ground in territories worldwide. With this new initiative, it is likely that Capcom is looking to become a major industry publisher; currently, the company has more of a cachet with hardcore gamers, due to its slate of high quality internal development studios. Gioia noted that current plans see these new licensed games being developed by Capcom's existing in-house developers of its own properties, rather than being outsourced to third party developers. Perhaps surprisingly, she also stated that she is looking into ways to tie in licensed properties "with recognizable characters or story lines associated with existing game engines."