Take-Two's MLB Deal Solidified

I imagine tomorrow morning's phone conversations between Take-Two execs and other third party publishers will go something like this:

"Hi there, [third party baseball publisher]. You know those crafty plans you had for co-branding an MLB title with one of the first-party developers like Sony or Microsoft, under the terms of our announced deal with the MLBPA? Yeah, you can forget them."

That's because, as our news story reports, the publishing company has locked up a long-term licensing agreement with Major League Baseball Properties, the aforementioned MLBPA, and Major League Baseball Advanced Media which will give Take-Two sole rights to publish and distribute officially license MLB games for consoles, PC, and handhelds. We already knew about the MLBPA deal, which was announced last week. This supplemental announcement essentially secures the other half of the MLB exclusives equation, including all 30 MLB clubs, MLB players, ballparks, and minor league clubs for use in Take-Take baseball titles.

In addition, according to terms of the deal, there will be no room for maneuvering on the part of other third-party publishers to collaborate with first-party console-makers such as Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony, all of whom will still be allowed to produce MLB games for their proprietary consoles. In short, the deal serves as notice to third-party competitors (most prominently, EA Sports) that, beginning in 2006, they'll no longer be welcome in the MLB videogame market space.

From a gaming standpoint, the deal's major points of interest include a smaller proviso which allows the Take-Two line of titles to take advantage of MLB.com online content (which would be the perfect presentation vehicle for whatever online capabilities next year's Take-Two baseball games contain). In addition, Take-Two stated that they had no intention on sitting on their exclusivity, and plan to begin releasing hardball games "year-round," in the arcade, simulation and manager-style sub-genres. In addition, the company expressed interest in exploring handheld baseball possibilities on platforms such as the Nintendo DS and the upcoming Sony PSP.