Decipher Acquires Trek RPG & Miniature License

Decipher, the publisher of the official Star Trek Customisable Card Game, announced today that it has signed an agreement with Viacom to expand Decipher's Star Trek license to include role playing games, miniatures, miniature games and customizable disk strategy games.

Commenting on the acquisition, Decipher Chairman and CEO Warren Holland said, "We are very proud that Viacom Consumer Products chose to grant Decipher the rights to these additional categories. We have a wealth of talent, image resources, and passion for Star Trek. The plan is to bring our state-of-the-art computer graphics systems and innovative game designs to bear on the creative opportunities afforded by these new categories. We look forward to building upon the successful relationship we have had with Viacom Consumer Products and the Star Trek franchise since 1992."

Under the terms of the agreement, Decipher will get exclusive rights for these categories beginning January 1, 2001 for the United States and Canada, and July 1, 2001 for the rest of the world. However, some of these rights will be subject to the expiration of existing agreements between Viacom and other companies.

What this probably also means is that Last Unicorn Games, the current holder of the Trek RPG license, will no longer be able publish any further Trek RPG products. Last Unicorn, which was recently bought by Wizards of the Coast, obtained the license two years ago, and has published RPG lines based on TNG, DS9 and the Original Series, winning several RPG awards in the process. They recently also announced 'Red Alert', a disk-based Trek strategy game. It seems strange that they would lose the license to these products so soon after obtaining it, but that does appear to be the case.

More on this can be found in the official press release from Decipher.

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