Two Random Industry Veterans are Reviving Telltale Games

Oof, okay, let’s do this.

So, as you’re probably aware, adventure gaming savants Telltale Games shut down last year following explosive, unsustainable growth, terrible management, and a recognizable decline in quality, which lead to most employees being fired without severance pay. It was ugly, it was messy, and it got the entire gaming world spinning on its head for a real long time.

And before the corpse of that company could even cool, it’s back from the dead, revived by two gaming veterans at LCG Entertainment - the people who never even worked with Telltale before, but apparently want to keep adventure games in the discourse.

LCG Entertainment is headed by two industry veterans: Brian Waddle, the chief marketer for the Havok game engine. And Jamie Ottilie, CEO of Galaxy Pest Control, a mobile game studio, who had this to say about the acquisition:

"This is a viable business that went away due to market conditions and some scale choices [Telltale's previous management] made. I like games that tell stories and I think our industry should have a company that specializes in narrative-driven games."

But Telltale wasn’t just known for making narrative-driven games: they were known for working with other peoples' IPs and crafting new stories with them. And in that respect, this new Telltale has a lot of work to do. While they’ve confirmed they have the rights to Batman, The Wolf Among Us, and a new title called Puzzle Agent, they absolutely do not have the rights to Stranger Things and The Walking Dead. Other famous IPs, like Minecraft, Borderlands, Guardians of the Galaxy, and Game of Thrones, are still in a state of limbo.

Oh, and they’re willing to re-hire old Telltale employees. As freelancers. “With the possibility of full-time roles.”

…I gotta admit, guys, something about this just smells really fishy to me.