Viacom Wants Their Money Back
A recent SEC filing suggests media-giant Viacom is looking to reacquire the money they initially loaned to Harmonix some years back. This comes on the heels of one of the worst years for music games, as sales have plunged, due in large part to market saturation and the high cost of peripherals.
Viacom believes they are “entitled to a refund”, although the final amount has “not yet been determined.”
“…in 2008, we paid $150 million, subject to adjustment, under this earn-out agreement related to 2007 performance. At December 31, 2009, we believe that we are entitled to a refund of a substantial portion of amounts previously paid, but the final amount of the earn-out has not yet been determined,”
This certainly implies Viacom was not pleased with the lukewarm sales of the studio’s latest title, The Beatles: Rock Band. And it is certainly a shame, because back when music games were in their prime, Harmonix consistently put out excellent titles.
9 Responses to “Viacom Wants Their Money Back”
Was’t Viacom responsible for the writer’s strike a while back?
id want my $ back too…rockband :beatles was horrible…the skill level wasnt hard enuf… why cant there be megadeth in the beatles []V[]3 g A |) 3 T []-[]
Seems to me like Paul and Ringo are the only ones that might have made money on this deal…
All I have to say is HA HA!
Wow, Activision single-handedly destroyed a genre. Poor Harmonix.
@SpeCtR
Rock Band: Megadeth would come with a Surgeon General Warning because it would be too great.
“WARNING: ROCK BAND: MEGADETH WILL KILL YOU”
i need to get the new megadeth pack that just came out!!!! sikk sikk sikkk…whole album too.. whats ur psn id… ill play withya… n i have the other megadeth album in the music store… can pretty much 95% the songs or better on xpert drums
Those peripherals are the death of music games. Games like DJ Hero which would have been a beast in sales fell off because they cost upwards of 100 dollars, which kills sales. They only peripheral that hasn’t suffered from these high prices are things like Wii Fit and Wii Fit Plus because of the health benefits that come along with them. I hate that they cost soo much. Plus wee get things like Tony Hawk which total turn people off because they cheat people. Put them around the price of normal games with the benefit of the game packaged with them and they’d sale like hotcakes. Come on people it’s common sense.
actually i heard wii fit isnt doing as great as it was/should….the cost is very considering…the drumset alone was $300… could have another ps3 for all that!!! rock band ftw!!