THQ Nordic Requires EA’s Approval Before Doing Anything with Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning

Steven Santana September 10, 2018 4:59 PM EST

THQ Nordic has revealed that the publishing rights to Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning are still with EA, leaving it up to them to allow a re-release.

In an email to Eurogamer THQ Nordic has explained that EA still has the publishing rights to Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning. This comes after THQ Nordic announced on Thursday morning that they had acquired the Kingdoms of Amalur IP, among other assets, from developer 38 Studios.

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning was a PlayStation 3/Xbox 360 game that released in early 2012 with developer 38 Studios going bankrupt later that year. The IP rights for Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning eventually were possessed by the state of Rhode Island due to their funding. Now the IP lies in the hands of THQ Nordic who are also busy buying and reviving other acquired IPs such as Darksiders, Timesplitters, and Red Faction.

EA still has the publishing rights to Reckoning, about any other details about the relationship between EA and 38 Studios we can’t comment. At this stage we ‘only’ acquired the intellectual property. Given our track record, we know what the burning questions (remaster, remake, port to current-gen systems etc.) are, but we decided do not answer those specifically as we tend to put our heads together first and then do our homework, and only start to talk about anything once we feel confident and very familiar with the franchise.

The death of 38 Studios meant Kingdoms of Amalur 2 was scrapped as well as the ambitious goal of creating an MMORPG named Project Copernicus. Now with THQ Nordic behind the IP it may see another revival. Darksiders III releases on November 27, 2018 after a period of limbo due to developer Vigil Games and publisher THQ going bankrupt in early 2013. Perhaps we will see another Kingdoms of Amalur game in a few years, most likely after a re-release of the original as was done with Darksiders. You can read our review for the original Kingdoms of Amalur which we said would, “likely satisfy those looking for a reprieve from the world of other recent entries in the genre.”