Quick TakeArticle at a glance
- Discovery deal officially closed on October 6, 2026, putting Batman: Arkham developer Rocksteady, Mortal Kombat studio NetherRealm, and LEGO maker TT Games under one new owner overnight — and neither company's official announcement mentioned video games once.
- Discovery shareholders received $31.02 per share in cash, part of a deal structure that also included $47 billion in new equity investment at $12.00 per share, according to Skydance's own closing announcement .
- The deal folds in two film studios, HBO Max and Discovery+, CNN and CBS News, TNT Sports and CBS Sports, and cable brands from Cartoon Network to Food Network.
The Skydance Warner Bros. Discovery deal officially closed on October 6, 2026, putting Batman: Arkham developer Rocksteady, Mortal Kombat studio NetherRealm, and LEGO maker TT Games under one new owner overnight — and neither company’s official announcement mentioned video games once.
What Actually Closed Today
Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders received $31.02 per share in cash, part of a deal structure that also included $47 billion in new equity investment at $12.00 per share, according to Skydance’s own closing announcement. WBD stock stopped trading on Nasdaq the same day; the combined company now trades on the NYSE under the ticker SKYD. David Ellison is chairman and CEO of the new Skydance, with former WBD leader Ynon Kreiz staying on as co-CEO.
The deal folds in two film studios, HBO Max and Discovery+, CNN and CBS News, TNT Sports and CBS Sports, and cable brands from Cartoon Network to Food Network. It is one of the largest media mergers in a decade — and, as of this week, it also makes Skydance the new corporate parent of four major video game studios.
The DC and Gaming Studios That Just Changed Hands
Warner Bros. Games and its subsidiary studios now sit inside Skydance. That includes Rocksteady Studios, the London developer behind the Batman: Arkham series; NetherRealm Studios, maker of Mortal Kombat and Injustice; TT Games, the LEGO games specialist; and Avalanche Software, the Hogwarts Legacy studio, according to reporting from Inven Global on the day the deal closed.
| Studio | Best Known For | New Parent Company (as of Oct 6, 2026) |
|---|---|---|
| Rocksteady Studios | Batman: Arkham series | Skydance |
| NetherRealm Studios | Mortal Kombat, Injustice | Skydance |
| TT Games | LEGO video games | Skydance |
| Avalanche Software | Hogwarts Legacy | Skydance |
Neither Company Mentioned Video Games. One Insider Called It a “Secret Weapon.”
GameSpot pointed out that Paramount and Skydance’s official closing announcements did not reference video games a single time, despite the deal handing Skydance four established studios overnight. Internally, the picture looks different: Tony Driscoll, who runs Paramount Games Studio, is leading integration of the Warner Bros. Games acquisition, and a rival studio executive told The Hollywood Reporter that Warner Bros. Games is Skydance’s “secret weapon,” per Cosmic Book News’ October 6, 2026 report.
A Day One memo from Ellison and Kreiz to staff reportedly named Hogwarts Legacy and Mortal Kombat among the core franchises the combined company plans to build around, alongside titles from the wider DC, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Transformers and Star Trek portfolio — though the memo did not spell out a full roster of what stays and what gets cut.
Why DC Universe Online and Injustice Fans Should Pay Attention
DC Universe Online is published by Daybreak Game Company and developed by Dimensional Ink Games, but its license to use Batman, Superman and the rest of the DC roster comes from Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment on behalf of DC Entertainment. That licensing relationship now runs through Skydance, the same company that just inherited NetherRealm Studios’ Injustice games. We covered the Injustice 3 motion-capture leak earlier this year, and TT Games’ LEGO Batman line — most recently its Legacy of the Dark Knight DLC — is now made by a Skydance studio too. None of this changes what is live today, but it means the next Batman game announcement, from any of these studios, comes from a company that did not exist a week ago.
The Shadow Over the Deal: A Targeted $6 Billion in Cuts
The closing comes after months of warnings about Warner Bros. Games’ finances. In March 2026, Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter and NYU Stern video games professor Joost Van Dreunen told TheWrap that the games division was a plausible target for a chunk of the merger’s targeted $6 billion in cost cuts, pointing to the back-to-back underperformance of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League and MultiVersus. WB Games Montreal had already cut more than 300 positions by that point. On the other side of the ledger, Hogwarts Legacy has sold more than 34 million copies and Mortal Kombat 1 and Mortal Kombat 11 have sold a combined 21 million, per estimates reported by PocketGamer.biz in December 2025 — the kind of numbers that make a division worth protecting, not just cutting.
What Happens Next
No studio closures, cancellations or layoffs tied specifically to this week’s closing have been announced. Integration is just beginning, and Skydance has given no public timeline for when its plans for Rocksteady, NetherRealm, TT Games or Avalanche Software will become concrete. Until then, the honest answer is that Batman, Mortal Kombat and Injustice all have a new corporate parent, and what that parent decides to do with them is still unwritten.
Frequently Asked Questions
Did the Skydance-Warner Bros. Discovery deal include video games?
Yes. Skydance’s $111 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, which closed October 6, 2026, included Warner Bros. Games and its studios — Rocksteady, NetherRealm, TT Games and Avalanche Software — even though neither company’s official press release mentioned video games.
Who owns Rocksteady and NetherRealm Studios now?
Both studios are now owned by Skydance, the company formed when Paramount Skydance completed its acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery on October 6, 2026.
Will Mortal Kombat or Batman: Arkham games be cancelled?
No cancellations have been announced. A Day One memo from Skydance leadership reportedly named Hogwarts Legacy and Mortal Kombat among the franchises the company plans to keep building, but no full list of what stays or goes has been made public.
What does this mean for DC Universe Online?
DC Universe Online’s DC license comes from Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, which is now part of Skydance. The game itself is still published by Daybreak Game Company and developed by Dimensional Ink Games, and nothing about its day-to-day operation has changed.
