Union and Top Cow Sign Comic-To-Game Deals

Union Entertainment, a production company of both films and video games, has signed a deal with Top Cow Productions to develop more games based on Top Cow's line of comic books. The two companies have already worked together once, when Union brokered Top Cow's The Darkness property into a game to be developed by Starbreeze for next-generation systems. Top Cow was originally formed as an Image Comics studio by artist Marc Silvestri, and is one of the few original Image studios still running. Its properties, which remain creator-owned, are Witchblade, Magdalena, Aphrodite IX, Hunter/Killer, and Wanted, all of which are in some stage of development for video games by Union. In addition to those books, Union and Top Cow will work together to create new franchises which will see multimedia releases as comics, films, and video games. "The Top Cow / Union deal gives Union a rich universe of content on which to base video games, as well as opportunities to create new content with Top Cow," says Union president Richard Leibowitz. "As the business of video games further evolves to mirror that of feature films, including demand for source material and above-the-line talent, this deal enables us to meet emerging demands and further establishes Union as the leading Hollywood-style production company in video games."