In a move that, well, damn well suprised both EA and Microsoft (who were also courting them not too long ago), Vivendi and Activsion will merge (in a series of complex combo transactions of stock and cash that would make any World of Warcraft player proud) to form Activision Blizzard.
For the record, Activision will oversee production of all the (formerly Universal) Vivendi games, franchises, and IPs (Crash, Spyro, Call of Duty); Blizzard (WoW, Warhammer, Diablo) will continue to operate mostly independently.
And since Activision also bought Guitar Hero pub Red Octane earlier this year, that places both your GH Axe and you WoW axe under the same roof. It also makes the combined company the largest Vid Game publisher, just overtaking EA until they buy someone else.
(Atari on line two….)
Over at Need Coffee....