Capcom buys mobile game publisher

Capcom Entertainment is the latest major game maker to buy into the mobile gaming space, announcing today plans to acquire Cosmic Infinity for an undisclosed sum.

Unlike competitor Electronic Arts, Capcom bought small instead of big. Last year, EA bought the world’s largest mobile game publisher Jamdat Mobile for $680 million, instantly bolstering EA’s nascent mobile portfolio and propelling it to the top of the list of mobile game publishers. In contrast, Cosmic Infinity is a small developer/publisher with only six employees and a handful of titles, but one of those games is “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,” a top seller globally.

Capcom’s Mobile and Interactive Media division general manager Midori Yuasa said Capcom chose Cosmic Infinity specifically not for its size but its expertise. While many of the large publishers outsource both their console/PC and mobile games to third-party developers, Yuasa said, Capcom has a tradition of developing its own games in house, and consequently was looking for a publisher that did the same.

“I’ve been looking to build key internal production resources,” Yuasa said. “I wasn’t looking for a huge company. I was looking for the right management and the right expertise.”

Capcom Mobile launched just in January and has since been releasing games in the U.S. market at a rate or one a month. Most of those games have been mobile versions of big Capcom console game franchises such as Resident Evil and Mega Man, targeted mainly at the hardcore gamer segment, but Yuasa said that Capcom Mobile is expanding into the mass market casual gaming market, and the acquisition of Cosmic Infinity will bolster its efforts in that space with “Millionaire” and other casual titles. With the exception of EA, all of the top 10 publishers either specialize in hard-core games drawn from the console or independent casual games. Capcom plans to be the next exception, Yuasa said.