Amazon has acquired video game developer Double Helix Games, presumably to produce first party titles for its much rumoured games console.
The news of the acquisition leaked through an invitation to a joint recruiting event from Amazon and Double Helix Games on February 13.
Following the leak, which was first reported by TechCrunch, Amazon provided the following brief statement: "Amazon has acquired Double Helix as part of our ongoing commitment to build innovative games for customers."
The deal involves Amazon acquiring Double Helix’s 75-strong team of staff and its IP.
Double Helix Games was responsible for one of the Xbox One console’s launch games, Killer Instinct, which was built using its own HEX engine. Microsoft has confirmed through a statement to Polygon that it will be using a different development partner on the Killer Instinct franchise from now on.
Most recently, Double Helix has been working with Capcom on an imminent reboot of the Japanese company’s classic action platformer, Strider. The game is set to launch on February 19, so is presumably already complete.
This news follows a report at the end of January claiming that Amazon was to launch an Android-powered games console in 2014.
The console will apparently cost less than $300 / £180, and is said to be a similar size to the revised PSOne console (so a lot smaller than the Xbox One and PS4).
As you might expect from an Amazon console, it will also be able to download and stream TV, movie, and music content from the company’s vast multimedia library.
There’s been nothing official on the Amazon console as yet, but at the beginning of January the company revealed that it was working on a product that would "deliver Digital Media to our customers in new ways and disrupt the current marketplace," and that would be "bigger than Kindle."
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