Sony Rumored to Be in Talks to Buy FromSoftware Owner Kadokawa Corporation

This morning, some earth-shattering rumors are coming from the Land of the Rising Sun. Reuters reports that Sony is in talks to buy FromSoftware owner Kadokawa Corporation. Two sources said a deal could be closed in the coming weeks. The mere rumor was enough to send Kadokawa’s stock up nearly 23% today.

Like most big Japanese corporations, Kadokawa is really old. It was actually founded only a few months after the end of the Second World War. Needless to say, a lot has changed since then. The most recent version of the corporation was borne out of the October 2014 merger with Dwango.

The group as a whole has several branches for publishing books, manga, films, anime, and much more. Of course, for Sony’s PlayStation, the fact that Kadokawa owns nearly 70% of FromSoftware, the studio behind Demon’s Souls, Bloodborne, Dark Souls, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, and Elden Ring, is clearly a big deal. Moreover, if you’ve been reading Wccftech, this might not surprise you that much.

Sony already entered a capital alliance with Kadokawa in February 2021. In August 2022, they even invested directly in FromSoftware, acquiring around 14% of the shares (Tencent also purchased 16% of the shares at the same time). Shortly following the latter announcement, Hermen Hulst (then head of PlayStation Studios, now CEO of SIE’s Studio Business Group) hinted at possible collaborations with FromSoftware not only on games but also on adaptations through the PlayStation Productions division.

Fast-forward to this July, and renowned author G.R.R. Martin, who famously contributed to the worldbuilding and lore behind Elden Ring, teased in a not-so-subtle fashion that a feature film or a TV series adaptation might be on the way. Again, it wouldn’t be out of character for Sony, which is pushing a lot of its big franchises (Uncharted, The Last of Us, Gran Turismo, God of War, Ghost of Tsushima, while the Horizon Netflix TV series was halted due to the showrunner’s issues) to be adapted for cinema or television.

Fans of FromSoftware’s games are really only interested in knowing how this potential acquisition might affect them, though. Would Sony remove the studio’s upcoming games from Xbox and possibly stagger their PC releases? It seems unlikely. Much of the studio’s success was built on the multiplatform availability of most of its games, and besides, Sony has already shown with Bungie that they’re willing to let a newly purchased studio keep making games for other platforms, too.

Meanwhile, Elden Ring: Shadow of the Erdtree was nominated for the GOTY category at The Game Awards 2024 and has a solid chance of winning again.