EA and Hasbro strike a deal

EA Casual, a newly launched arm of Electronic Arts, will be soon developing games based on popular Hasbro franchises. Hasbro and EA Casual have finalized a licensing deal. The games developer will churn out games for all conceivable platforms including consoles, web and mobile devices. This augurs well for EA Casual, as the label was born only in June 2007.

The quid-pro-quo end of the bargain means that even Hasbro would be allowed to make toys and traditional games based on popular EA games franchises. EA plans to release the first Hasbro-based games in 2008 though no word was given on when Hasbro will begin releasing EA-inspired toys.

Hasbro owns many board games including Monopoly and Scrabble, most of which are household names. EA will not own licensing rights to all Hasbro franchises since some are still owned by Activision. It is also of note that Atari had bought licensing rights for seven years in 2005 but sold the rights back to Hasbro barely a month ago. This gave EA Casual a window of opportunity, and they seem to have capitalized on it.

EA is expanding its interest in casual video games beyond its casual game site, Pogo, with the Hasbro toy tie-ins making for even greater exposure (and potentially more interesting toys).

Read [Gamespot] Also Read [ICV2]