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Konami Nabs the Turtles

by Billy Berghammer - September 10, 2002, 2:03 pm EDT
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Dust off your pizza launcher because the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are coming back. Let's just pray they leave Vanilla Ice out of it this time around....

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Konami Back As Exclusive TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES Video Game Creator/Publisher

New York, NY (September 10, 2002) - 4Kids Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE:

KDE), the exclusive worldwide agent and co-producer of the all-new TEENAGE

MUTANT NINJA TURTLES animated series, today announced that Mirage

Licensing, Inc., the holder of the rights to TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA

TURTLES, has licensed Konami Corporation as the exclusive worldwide

developer and publisher of video games. This agreement is based on the

upcoming all-new TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES animated series,

which is scheduled to debut on the FOX BOX in the first quarter of 2003.

The agreement returns Konami to the role the gaming giant held during

the birth of the TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES phenomenon in the late

1980’s and early ‘90’s, when the company created a dozen TMNT video games

with gross cumulative sales of nearly half a billion dollars.

With the first release planned for the 2003 holiday season, the all-new

Konami-created TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES video games will be

published across multiple game platforms.

Premiering September 14, 2002 on FOX, the FOX BOX is a Saturday

morning children’s television block programmed by 4Kids Entertainment. In

addition to co-producing the new TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES

television series, 4Kids also serves as the exclusive merchandise licensing agent

for the property worldwide.

“We are delighted to welcome back Konami as publisher of TEENAGE

MUTANT NINJA TURTLES video games,” said Al Kahn, Chairman and CEO

of 4Kids Entertainment. “We look forward to Konami repeating its success with

the Turtles franchise.”

“4Kids’ and Mirage’ s exciting plans for the all-new TEENAGE

MUTANT NINJA TURTLES are designed to take this universally popular

franchise to new levels of success,” said Kazumi Kitaue, Konami Corporation

Executive Officer, CS Division. “The new Turtles television series offers

extraordinary creative opportunities for video game designers.”

Gary Richardson, CEO of Mirage, said, “ We’ re thrilled to partner with

Konami to produce video games based on the all-new TEENAGE MUTANT

NINJA TURTLES series. With Konami back as video game publisher and

Playmates Toys continuing as master toy licensee, we’ re excited to be working

with the team that helped Mirage create the original success of the franchise. We

can’ t wait to see samples of the new Konami TMNT video game on the big screen

at E3 in May of 2003.”

The TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES were created in May 1984

when Peter Laird and Kevin Eastman published a 40-page, black-and-white comic

book. The original TMNT animated series debuted in 1987. It was the #1

children’ s television show throughout the late 1980’ s and early ‘90’ s. TMNT

merchandise licensees, including Konami and Playmates Toys, were enormously

successful, reportedly selling approximately $3 billion in toys, video games and

other merchandise within all product categories worldwide to date.

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