Turbine to self-publish D&D Online
Significant investment opens doors for developer.
Turbine Entertainment, best known for its work on the massively-multiplayer Asheron's Call title for Microsoft Game Studios, has secured $18 million (€14.5m) in funding from its original investors and two venture capital firms, Highland Capital Partners and Polaris Venture Partners, and plans to use part of the money to self-publish its Dungeons & Dragons Online title.
According to a spokesperson, the latest round of investment signalled a "total shift in business model", allowing the developer to bring Dungeons & Dragons Online almost totally in-house - with server housing, technical support, billing, quality assurance and all the rest set to be handled internally. "We're taking out the middle man between us and our fans," Turbine says, although the firm retains its partnership with Atari for retail marketing and distribution.
Turbine is also working on The Lord of the Rings: Middle-Earth Online, Vivendi-Universal Games' massively-multiplayer take on the lands of J.R.R. Tolkien's novels, and some of cash from this latest round of funding will of course go towards shoring up that project.
