Editing Infocom (section)

===Activision takeover===
After ''Cornerstone'''s failure, Infocom laid off half of its 100 employees,<ref name="oxner198605">{{cite magazine |title=Hobby & Industry News |magazine=[[Computer Gaming World]] |issue=28 |date=May 1986 |url=http://www.cgwmuseum.org/galleries/index.php?year=1986&pub=2&id=28 |access-date=May 21, 2016| last=Oxner |first=Bill |page=4}}</ref> and [[Activision]] acquired the company on June 13, 1986, for $7.5&nbsp;million.<ref name="wilson199111"/> The merger was pushed by Activision's CEO [[Jim Levy]], who was a fan of Infocom games and felt their two companies were in similar situations.<ref name="edge history">{{cite magazine | url = http://www.edge-online.com/features/short-history-activision/ | title = A Short History Of Activision | date = August 24, 2006 | access-date = February 13, 2019 | magazine = [[Edge (magazine)|Edge]] | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20130404231907/http://www.edge-online.com/features/short-history-activision/ | archive-date=  April 4, 2013 }}</ref> Berez stated that although the two companies' headquarters and product lines would remain separate, "One of the effects of the merger will be for both of us to broaden our horizons". He said that "We're looking at graphics a lot", while Activision was reportedly interested in using Infocom's parser.<ref name="muse198609">{{cite news |url=https://archive.org/stream/inCider_1986-09#page/n15/mode/2up |title=Capturing a Buffalo |work=inCider |date=September 1986 |access-date=July 2, 2014 |author=Muse, Dan |pages=14–15}}</ref>

While relations were cordial between the two companies at first, Activision's ousting of Levy with new CEO [[Bruce Davis (video game industry)|Bruce Davis]] created problems in the working relationship with Infocom. Davis believed that his company had paid too much for Infocom and initiated a lawsuit against them to recoup some of the cost, along with changing the way Infocom was run. For example:
* Davis required they use Activision's packaging plant instead of their own in-house one, raising the cost of each package from $0.45 to over $0.90. In addition, the Activision plant made numerous mistakes in packaging, whereas the Infocom one almost never did.
* Infocom had a successful marketing approach that kept its [[backlist]] in store inventories for years. Because of this, older titles continued to sell, and their sales rose when the company released newer games. ''Zork'' especially benefited; its sales rose for years after its initial release in 1980. To Infocom's surprise it sold almost 100,000 copies of the game in 1983, and the figure rose by more than 50% in 1984.{{r|maher20130320}}<ref name="tommervik198303">{{cite news |url=http://www.cgwmuseum.org/galleries/index.php?year=1983&pub=6&id=10 |title=By Golly, That's a Good Game! / Masters of the Mousetrap Maxim Tell Why |work=Softline |date=March 1983 |access-date=July 28, 2014 |author=Tommervik, Margot Comstock |pages=30–32}}</ref> Activision preferred to market Infocom's games the way they marketed their other titles: replacing older titles with newer ones. While this made sense for the graphically intensive games that made up the rest of Activision's catalog, since Infocom games were text based, it didn't make sense – the newer games didn't have improved ''text''. This marketing approach cut off potential revenue for numerous Infocom titles that had consistently brought in money for several years.
* Davis required the struggling developer to produce eight titles a year. Infocom had traditionally produced about four games per year with more staff than they had post-merger.
* Davis pushed Infocom to release more graphical games, but the one they did release, ''[[Fooblitzky]]'', bombed. This was, in part, due to Infocom's long-standing rule of maximum portability; a game that could display graphics on a number of different systems couldn't take advantage of the strengths of any of them.
* The cost of acquisition was amortized by deducting it from Infocom's operating revenue during the next several years.