Namco Bandai Games America has attained the North American rights to publish official games for all platforms based on the popular Dragon Ball anime and manga series.
The company says its new five-year agreement supersedes publisher Atari's prior Dragon Ball rights contract. In 2007, distributor Funimation
claimed breach of contract against Atari, providing a challenge to the latter's battle to extend its rights to Dragon Ball.
Although NGBA's contract doesn't officially begin until 2010, the company says it has the rights to publish three titles in 2009 that might theoretically have been in doubt amid Atari and Funimation's contract conflict.
These include
Dragon Ball: Raging Blast for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3,
Dragon Ball: Revenge of King Piccolo for Wii, and
Dragon Ball Z: Attack of the Saiyans on DS.
Akira Toriyama's 1984 Dragon Ball manga developed into a long-lasting cross-media franchise, with over a decade of comic books, more than 500 TV episodes and 23 movies, plus toys, games and other merchandise.
