Return of the King
London, UK and San Jose, CA – July 15, 2002 – Digital Bridges, the world leader in the creation and distribution of mobile entertainment solutions, and MJ Entertainment, licensing agent for Playmore (SNK-NeoGeo), one of the world’s premier publishers and developers of video games and systems, announce today that some of the world’s most popular and highly acclaimed arcade games--including the landmark title, King Of Fighters--will soon be available to owners of the latest generation of mobile phones featuring Java processing capabilities.
The deal allows Digital Bridges to recreate a number of SNK's most famous titles from the extensive back-catalogue of NeoGeo games for arcade, home console and handheld devices. The games will be published worldwide through Digital Bridges’ network of more than 40 mobile networks and operators, giving the titles an unparalleled global distribution and access to networks with more than 255 million subscribers.
SNK Neo Geo titles are a legend in the video games industry. The initial games to be developed by Digital Bridges will include King Of Fighters, one of the most popular action games and considered a classic by many beat-em-up fans. The King Of Fighters series was launched by SNK in 1994 and has been a colossal success ever since, spawning almost a dozen sequels, across multiple arcade, home and handheld platforms. With over 1 million Neo Geo arcade machines still in use today, the King Of Fighters series is one of the most successful fighting games in the world.
Additional games Digital Bridges will develop include Metal Slug and Samurai Showdown, both based on SNK’s hit arcade fighting games. Mobile game players will be part of Metal Slug’s special-forces elite squad to bring down Col. Bildegaan and his army jumping, shooting and evading their way through treacherous and unimaginable battles. Playing Samurai Showdown, the mobile gamer will become one of 15 different Samurai warriors or choose one of three new fighters each possessing two different fight techniques.
The SNK-NeoGeo Game series has generated billions of dollars worldwide since its products were first introduced. Now the SNK-NeoGeo mobile games created by Digital Bridges will reach an entirely new generation of fans.
Java Gaming
Java gaming is the next step in the evolution of mobile entertainment. Mobile handsets with Java processing allow users to download applications and run them locally on the handset itself. This is an enormous advance from the current generation of mobile entertainment, which relies on a remote server for processing capabilities. Java handsets can support the dynamic graphics and rapid gameplay necessary to bring arcade-style games to life on mobile phones. With recent research indicating more than 420 million Java enabled phones on the market by 2003*, Java gaming has the potential to make mobile the largest gaming platform in the world.
“Java represents an extremely valuable new market for mobile entertainment companies and promises to dramatically escalate the number of users playing mobile games regularly,” said Brian Greasley, CEO of Digital Bridges. “MJ Entertainment and Playmore have an enviable reputation for creating fantastic games with incredible long-term appeal. The high recognition value of titles such as King of Fighters will help to ensure that Digital Bridges replicates its success in SMS and WAP gaming by allowing us to create a market leading collection of Java games.”
“Mobile gaming is a very exciting new area for games companies and promises to reach a new and potentially enormous audience, outside the normal console market,” said Ron Czerny, President MJ Entertainment. “We are very pleased to be working with Digital Bridges, to bring many of the SNK-NeoGeo games to a new generation of gamers – and cell phone owners – throughout Europe, North America and Latin America.”
ENDS.
*ARC Group, “Wireless Java: Handset Application Revenue Streams”, November 2001
Notes to Editors
About Digital Bridges
Founded in 1998, Digital Bridges is the world leader in the creation and distribution of mobile entertainment solutions. An industry pioneer, Digital Bridges brings the best in mobile entertainment to over 40 operators, portals and other mobile content distributors worldwide representing over 255 million subscribers. The company possesses a unique combination of mobile technology, development and publishing expertise, and works with many of the world’s leading media and entertainment brands including Star Trek, Big Brother, Scooby Doo, Thunderbirds, Cartoon Network, Ali G Indahouse, Men in Black, The Weakest Link, Space Invaders, EA Sports FIFA and EA Sports Tiger Woods*. UNITY, the company’s best-in-class technology platform, supports all current and future mobile standards, protocols, technologies and operating systems. Digital Bridges’ investors include Apax Partners, Telesystem-Argo Global Capital and Openwave. Digital Bridges has its commercial headquarters in London, with technology & publishing divisions in Edinburgh, Scotland, as well as sales offices in New York, Singapore, Hong Kong, Paris, Munich, and Stockholm.
*All brands are registered trademarks of their respective owners.
About Playmore (SNK-NeoGeo)
The Playmore Corporation owns all the NeoGeo and SNK intellectual property rights, trademark rights, patent rights and copyrights of the former SNK Corporation. Playmore was formed in August of 2001 and is based in Osaka, Japan. The former SNK Corporation's NeoGeo brand hardware and software products have produced some of the highest quality production values that had superior game play features that built franchises and a track record of hit games. Most of which have crossed on to all platforms including Arcade, Console & Hand held systems as players favorite hits. With familiar titles like The King of Fighters, Samurai Showdown and Metal Slug. Playmore develops, manufactures, imports, exports, sales and leases electronic amusement machines worldwide.
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[ July 16, 2002: Message edited by: Blaine ]</p>
