The rights to THQ’s Darksiders franchise went unsold during the company’s first bankruptcy auction, but it seems like Darksiders isn’t quite dead yet: Crysis developer Crytek has announced that they’re planning to purchase the rights to the series.
The announcement was made last night on Twitter by Crytek USA’s David Adams. Adams was one of the co-founders of Vigil Games, the original developer of Darksiders, before it was shut down following THQ’s bankruptcy earlier this year. Since most of the Crytek USA team is also made up of former Vigil employees, Adams says his company is attempting to buy the rights to the series because “[We] put 7 years of heart and soul into that franchise, and I think it belongs at home with its creators.”
If Crytek’s bid is successful, it would make Darksiders the second THQ franchise they’ve bought the rights to: the company originally purchased the IP rights to Homefront during the initial wave of THQ auctions for the surprisingly low price of $500,000.
This is definitely good news if you were a fan of the Darksiders franchise (as I was,) and assumed the series was dead after Vigil Games was shuttered. Of course, Crytek USA still has to win the rights to the franchise during THQ’s next auction: other developers, including Platinum Games (developers of Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance and Bayonetta,) have expressed interest in buying the franchise as well. Regardless of who wins the auction, I think it’s safe to say that we haven’t seen the last of the Darksiders franchise — hopefully now somebody will be able to resolve the cliff-hanger ending that both the first and second games ended on.
