Disney Infinity, the cross-platform, cross-franchise, toys-as-games entity, is now canceled, with the final playset releases being the end of Infinity. The latest financial reports for Disney coming out reveal that the interactive division of Disney lost $147 million, with Disney canceling Infinity and ending their game publishing business. This doesn’t mean that Disney games will no longer exist, it just means that third-parties are going to solely make them. It’ll be interesting to see what happens to other Disney games on mobile – Star Wars: Commander (Free) got a recent update, and Disney Crossy Road (Free) just came out. Though, reports are just rolling in about Disney as a game publisher’s fate, so it’ll all become clear soon. Wall Street Journal reporter Ben Fritz broke the story:
Disney falls short of Wall Street estimates for revenue and earnings, stock falls 6% in after-hours trading
— Ben Fritz (@benfritz) May 10, 2016
Disney cancels struggling Infinity video game line. Takes $147 million charge. End of Disney as video game publisher.
— Ben Fritz (@benfritz) May 10, 2016
This is rather shocking considering that Disney’s got both Marvel and Star Wars along with all their other famous franchises in this toy set, and yet that wasn’t enough to keep it afloat. What’s also interesting is that the Apple TV abandonment of Disney Infinity 3.0 apparently wasn’t necessarily a canary in the coal mine for Apple TV gaming, but for Disney Infinity. A sad yet fascinating turn of events for sure.
