Activision

About Activision

Activision, Inc. is an American video game developer and publisher. It was the first independent developer and distributor of video games for gaming consoles, founded on October 1, 1979. Its first products were cartridges for the Atari 2600 video console system, and it is now one of the largest third party video game publishers in the world, so far being the top publisher of 2007 in the U.S. On January 18, 2008, Activision announced they were the top US publisher in 2007, according to the NPD Group.

On December 2, 2007, it was announced that Activision would merge with Vivendi Games. The new company will be called Activision Blizzard.

Before the formation of Activision, software for video game consoles was published exclusively by makers of the systems for which the games were designed. For example, Atari was the only publisher of games for the Atari 2600. This was particularly galling to the developers of the games, as they received no financial rewards for games that sold well, and did not receive credit for their games. After watching a number of games turn into multi-million-dollar best sellers, a number of programmers decided that they'd had enough and left. Activision became the first third-party game publisher for game consoles.