Disney recently announced that it will invest $1.5 billion for an equity stake in Epic Games, Deadline reported.
This deal also includes a multiyear collaboration focused on Fortnite and powered by Unreal Engine. Disney and Epic Games will create a games and entertainment universe with Fortnite as the focal point in order to widen Disney's reach.
A press released stated, “In addition to being a world-class games experience and interoperating with Fortnite, the new universe will offer a multitude of opportunities for consumers to play, watch, shop and engage with content, characters and stories from Disney, Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars, Avatar and more.”
The release continued, “Players, gamers and fans will be able to create their own stories and experiences, express their fandom in a distinctly Disney way, and share content with each other in ways that they love.”
When Iger returned to Disney in 2022, he met with Parks & Experiences chief Josh D'Amaro and his team. He said the first thing D'Amaro's team showed him were the demographics.
“When I saw Gen Z, and Gen Alpha, and even Millennials, and I saw the amount of time they were spending, in terms of their total media screen time, on video games, it was stunning to me — it was equal to what they spend on TV and movies,” Iger said.
“And the conclusion I reached was, we have to be there. And we have to be there as soon as we possibly can in a very compelling way,” he added.
After seeing the success of Disney characters and franchises on Fortnite, Iger met with Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney and “started a discussion about, what if we create a gigantic Disney World that could live next to Fortnite and be completely interconnected with it? A world where people could play games that we create, could create their own games, could watch.”
The Disney CEO stated, “Our exciting new relationship with Epic Games will bring together Disney’s beloved brands and franchises with the hugely popular Fortnite in a transformational new games and entertainment universe. This marks Disney’s biggest entry ever into the world of games and offers significant opportunities for growth and expansion. We can’t wait for fans to experience the Disney stories and worlds they love in groundbreaking new ways.”
“Disney was one of the first companies to believe in the potential of bringing their worlds together with ours in Fortnite … Now we’re collaborating on something entirely new to build a persistent, open and interoperable ecosystem that will bring together the Disney and Fortnite communities,” Sweeney said.
D'Amaro stated that the open ecosystem that Fornite has will allow consumers to engage with Disney more.
Disney and Epic Games already have a a collaboration in place through Fortnite through content integrations, in-game activations as well as live events such as the Marvel Nexus War with Galactus. The event was attended by over 15.3 million players. This announcement comes on the heels of Fortnite returning to iOS devices later this year.
Epic Games is the developer of Unreal Engine, which powers games such as Fortnite, Unreal, Gears of War and Infinity Blade.
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