Massive Entertainment, the minds behind the captive Ground Control and inventors of control point tactical game mechanics, won't be a part of the big family at Activision Blizzard. After years under the care of Sierra and then Vivendi, they're now posted up for sale to any takers - a confirmation of the other end of the merger deal between Vivendi and Activision.

Martin Walfisz, founder and president of Massive, said at the Develop conference last week:

Apparently [Activision] didn’t want an RTS studio in Europe, and to be honest we would have loved to have worked with Activision, but we’re pretty confident in our capabilities and there are not many studios that can match our quality.

He said that this unusual situation allowed them to keep poised for opportunities. After all, who was to look away from the creators of a new form of RTS and the minds behind award-winning World in Conflict? Activision may have, but Walfisz believes that there's other opportunities they could pursue.

Will Massive Entertainment break free from the mainstream and go independent? No one can be certain at the moment, but Massive is already pulling major decision strings for World in Conflict: Soviet Assault, at least for the console versions. And one thing is for certain: the World of Conflict franchise is no longer theirs, but Activision's.

We're told that Massive Entertainment's future has some hard times ahead as the company's status enters limbo, but Walfisz assures that they're still optimistic of what would come their way:

Massive has been in tough situations before in the past 12 years, and we’ve always come out stronger. Most of the guys in the company at least have faith in our ability to find a really interesting future.

We'll keep tabs on the major PC developer for the meantime. Updates as we get them.

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