The 3DO Revival That Wasn’t
Last week a defunct British developer, Empire Interactive, returned from the void with a pledge to revive the 3DO, one of many ’90s consoles that fell into the chasm of history. This week, the company said its plans have come to an abrupt conclusion, ending work to rebuild the hardware and remaster its games.
Key Takeaways:
- Empire Interactive blamed the “emergence of multiple parties claiming ownership rights over both the games and the console” and said it did not want to risk “prolonged legal disputes.”
- Canadian company Throwback Entertainment reportedly holds the 3DO trademark and related assets, and says it has no plans to sell them.
- The reversal came just days after the initial pledge to relaunch the console and remaster its games.
The legal fight would likely have cost far more than any potential 3DO revival could earn. But as detailed reporting on the dispute shows, the situation is more complicated than Empire’s LinkedIn posts make it out to be.
If your childhood spanned the ’90s, you may dimly recall the 3DO, a multimedia games console hybrid your friend’s cousin’s wealthy uncle apparently owned. The 3DO was one of a handful of also-ran platforms cut down in their prime by the PlayStation, and possibly the Saturn. Despite its short history and niche appeal, enough devotees remain to attempt some sort of retro comeback.
Wrong Rights, Wrong Ghost
It appears that while new Empire Interactive owner Işık Şekercigil owns rights connected to the 3DO company name, he doesn’t own any of the IP related to the console hardware or its games. Those rights are reportedly held by Throwback Entertainment, which said it had no plans to sell them on. Şekercigil later clarified that his firm acquired a trademark for “The 3DO Company” limited to game development and publishing, legally distinct from the 3DO console brand, and noted that console manufacturing rights involve Panasonic, Goldstar, and at least four other companies, per coverage of the collapse.
Either way, Best Buy shelves will not fill with new retro 3DO consoles ahead of the holiday season. Then again, nobody was elbowing rivals out of the way to buy one when the console originally launched at $699.99 in 1993.
Retro Dreams Meet Legal Reality
The episode says something about the retro revival economy. Dormant console brands keep getting resurrected because nostalgia sells, but decades of bankruptcies scatter IP rights across continents, and the paper trail usually kills the dream before the hardware exists. The 3DO’s own history, told alongside the rise of the PlayStation that buried it, shows why the brand still stirs feelings: it was an ambitious bet on CD-based multimedia during the industry’s leap from sprites to 3D graphics, priced far beyond what players would pay.
Preservation pressures make failed revivals sting more. With Sony confirming that physical PlayStation disc production ends in January 2028 and older digital stores closing, fans increasingly see legal limbo as the place where classic game libraries go to disappear. The 3DO’s catalogue, for now, stays right there.
Written by Alius Noreika
