The makers of the famous Project Gotham Racing, the UK based Bizzare Creations, were acquired by Activision.

By making this move, Activision intends to enter in the racing games market, in which Bizzare Creations is already an established leader. This acquisition represents the latest step in Activision’s strategy to enter new genres. Last year, Activision has entered in a similar manner in the music rhythm genre through its acquisition of RedOctane’s Guitar Hero franchise, which is one of the fastest growing franchises in the video game industry.

“Bizarre Creations will play an important role in our growth strategy as we develop an original new intellectual property for this important racing segment, expand our portfolio in other genres and utilize their proprietary technology for cross platform development,” explained  Mike Griffith, President and CEO of Activision Publishing.

According to the data released by NPD Group, the racing game market, is evaluated at $1.4 billion and represents more than 10% of the total video game market worldwide. Also the racing genre is rated as the fourth most popular video game genre

Bizzare Creations has already 10 years experience in the racing genre and they developed  the innovative multi-million unit franchise Project Gotham Racing for the Xbox and Xbox 360.

The Project Gotham Racing franchise currently has an average game Rating of 89%, according to GameRankings.com and has sold more than 4.5 million units in North America and Europe, according to The NPD Group, Charttrack and Gfk.

The latest title of the franchise, Project Gotham Racing 4, is set to be released sometimes next month.

“Our goal at Bizarre Creations has always been to do all we can to nurture our creative and passionate teams, who excel at and enjoy what they do. Activision’s independent studio model will continue giving us creative freedom to build exciting new brands. Their financial support and marketing prowess will also enable us to build upon the commercial success that we currently enjoy, and take the company and our games to an even higher level,“ said Martyn Chudley, Managing Director of Bizarre Creations.

Last year Bizzare Creations decided to try their luck in a new genre and they developed a third-person shooter for Sega, The Club. The game was postponed earlier this month and now is scheduled for release in early 2008.

According to statement posted on Bizzare Creation’s site, all teams will continue to exist exactly how they are at the moment. “Amax team (PGR4) and Shitstorm team (The Club) will move onto new games, whilst our Shared Technology team will use this opportunity to take our experience and tech to new levels and new formats.” it reads the statement.

Although the financial terms of the agreement with Activision weren’t disclosed, Bizzare Creation said they aren’t “a developer in financial trouble”

Bizzare Creations will become a wholly owned subsidiary of Activision and the company’s management team and employees continue with the company. The 160-person development studio is located in Liverpool, England.

Bizzare Creations already announced to new AAA titles for Activision. According to their site, one will be a racing game, and the other a character game.

As for the other games, “Geometry Wars will remain unaffected; we'll continue to expand and advance the series just as we were going to do before. The Club will still be released with SEGA, Geometry Wars Galaxies will still be released with Sierra, and PGR4 will continue to be supported after its launch in October” said Bizzare Creations.