Adam Creighton, Computer and Video Gaming: Halo merchandise monstro-morphs...

Other Blogs:
American McGee
Beautiful Pixels
Hideo Kojima
Hitachi Wasabe's Xbox 360

Xbox 360 Marketplace Updates: (MajorNelson.com)

Adam Creighton, Computer and Video Gaming (Subscribe)

Tuesday, June 19, 2007

Halo merchandise monstro-morphs...

Dang, I'm good.

From an earlier post of mine:

"(I wonder if JoyRide Studios lost the Halo franchise to McFarlane Toys? That would be sad.)"

Turns out McFarlane Toys is now doing the Halo 3 toys, with five figures (Master Chief, Brute Chieftain, Jackal Sniper, a two-pack of Grunts, and light-up action Cortana) and three mini (3-inch plastic and die-castmetal) vehicles (Warthog, Ghost, and Brute Chopper). The Brute Chopper is new for Halo 3, and this may be the first place it's been officially confirmed.

It's nice to see the figures will maintain a sense of relative scale (5", 6", 5", 3.5"and 4.5", respectively), and despite my previous rantings (across a few blogs) about the lack of articulation in McFarlane's toys, the press release says at least Master Chief will have "more than 18 points of articulation" (would that be "19"?), which ups the Joyride Series One's 15 points. No articulation notes are given for the other figures, which makes me nervous.

But wait, there's more!

Fox, having co-stalled the film that was to be co-produced by them and Universal Pictures, have now signed on to be the primary licensor for Halo, and will provide "a broad array of products, from books to apparel to collectible merchandise."

I've got mixed feelings on all of this licensing. As pro-game as I am, it's a game, not a blockbuster movie. Now, 14.5 million units on a franchise is inarguably market penetration, but is it enough? Also, even executive VP of domestic licensing for Fox Elie Dekel acknowledges, "Fox's licensing division focuses primarily on teens and young adults instead of kids". That makes Halo a great fit for Fox, but does it make for mass-consumerism for a mature-rated game (17 or older) demographic?

Also, the McFarlane toys, oddly, are due "by spring 2008" -- putting them 6 months (or more) after the release of Halo 3.

But the franchise undoubtedly has legs, so I'm curious to watch how all this licensing plays out.

Labels: announcements, Halo, licensing, media intersection, shooters, Xbox 360