Hogwarts Legacy 2 remains a "no brainer" as Netflix tries to buy Warner Bros Games

You've seen the news that Netflix is trying to buy Warner Bros, and you may have already heard that Paramount is another potential suitor that's trying to purchase the iconic film studio and many other assets under the big WB umbrella.

Gaming fans will know that, among those assets, Warner Bros has a sizeable video game business. Over the last few years, it's given us such massive hits as Hogwarts Legacy, and some disappointing flops like Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League.

The upcoming LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight is a Warner Bros project, too. And the Mortal Kombat franchise is another going concern that falls under the same massive WB umbrella.

So, is all of this gaming goodness caught up in the same acquisition from Netflix/Paramount? What does this mean for Hogwarts Legacy 2 or any potential Arkham game that might be in development?

We caught up over email with George Osborn, the industry expert behind the brilliant Video Games Industry Memo newsletter, to understand what the Netflix deal could mean for Warner Bros Games and gaming fans in general.

The good news for Harry Potter fans is that Hogwarts Legacy 2 is still looking like a "no brainer". Check out Osborn's insights in full below below!

Am I right in thinking that Warner Bros' games business is also being sold to Netflix (or maybe Paramount if they take over the deal)?

George Osborn: Yes, Warner Bros' games business is included in the deal. WB had reportedly been trying to sell off its game division last year. It didn’t. So it remains wrapped up in Netflix – or Paramount’s – acquisition of the company.

Do you know how big WB's games business is at the moment?

There is little publicly available information about the size of WB’s games business. Revenue did drop 48 per cent year-on-year between its 2023 and 2024 financial year. The success of Hogwarts Legacy was followed by the flop of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, which put it into a weaker position. This saw the company shrink its business, including through the closure of the Nemesis system creating Monolith Studios. It also means it has narrowed its focus, making Harry Potter, Game of Thrones, the DC Universe, and Mortal Kombat the four franchises it is building games around.

Do you think this will impact any major games that we already know about?

It’s really tough to say. However, the deal will take at least 12-18 months to complete barring any regulatory issues that emerge. Companies rarely take knee-jerk decisions around cancellations, lay-offs, or closures during this phase, as we saw with Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard. Anything in the pipeline is likely to be safe for now.

How would you define Netflix’s games business? Seems very mobile-focused to me.

Netflix’s games business has been confused for years. After starting off solely as a mobile game subscription service, it expanded into and then shuttered studios aimed at expanding it into other content verticals.

It now has a somewhat incoherent ‘cross-platform’ game business, in which players can access 80 or so mobile games through their Netflix account on multiple devices as well as some party games that are accessible via your television.

It feels like the company is still stumbling towards its video game plan, rather than assertively following one. That’s, understandably, not great news for WB Games.

Do you think WB and Netflix's games businesses will blend into one big business, or will they stay separate?

Netflix has revealed that it didn’t attribute any specific value to WB’s games business as part of its acquisition price.

Therefore, I think that Netflix will swallow WB’s games business into the wider company and then work out exactly what it wants to do with it.

There’s a chance it becomes part of its overall game strategy, providing Netflix with ready-made Triple A game-making clout to brute force its way into the business.

But my gut-feeling is that Netflix’s failure to attribute value to it means it is open-minded about what happens with WB Games. Selling to the right company at the right price feels like it might be on the table.

Assuming that WB was working on Hogwarts Legacy 2, do you think Netflix will keep that project going?

Warner Bros narrowed the focus of its game business towards projects that feel like ‘bankers’. Hogwarts Legacy was a massive commercial hit.

Of all the likely projects underway at the business that Netflix would happily continue, getting a sequel to that to market is probably the closest thing to a no-brainer for the company.

Assuming that WB was working on some sort of DC project at Rocksteady, do you think that continue being worked on?

I think a DC project at Rocksteady would continue to be worked on during the acquisition of Warner Bros, but I would say it is more at risk of problems than a sequel to Hogwarts Legacy.

Even though the hints are that Rocksteady is returning to its single player adventure roots, Suicide Squad was such a commercial flop that its work is almost certainly going to be scrutinised more closely.

If it is making a game in the mould of the recent Indiana Jones release, namely a tight single-player adventure clocking in at 15-20 hours but with excellent production values, they might be fine.

But if they’re working on a game with a development cycle as long as Suicide Squad’s, which was pegged at roughly seven to nine years, that would put it in a much more difficult position when the transaction closes.

In general, what does the Netflix deal mean for gaming fans?

Right now, the Netflix acquisition doesn’t mean that much. The company’s purchase isn’t guaranteed to go through due to competition concerns. It might also be edged out by Paramount’s hostile takeover bid.

In the long term though, it does mean that a major developer of Triple A video games could be owned by a company that didn’t assign it any value when bidding to buy Warner.

This means that the future of those studios are uncertain, unless Netflix has a change of heart or an interested buyer comes in to sweep them off the table.

For more insights from George Osborn, subscribe to the Video Game Industry Memo newsletter.

Check out more of our Gaming coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.