Jack of All Games, Inc. was an American distributor of video games and video game-related hardware based in

West Chester Township, Ohio West Chester Township is one of the thirteen civil township, townships of Butler County, Ohio, Butler County, Ohio, United States, located in the southeastern corner of the county. It is situated between Sharonville, Ohio, Sharonville and Liberty ...

. Founded by David Rosenbaum in 1989, the company was sold to Take-Two Interactive in August 1998. Through a series of acquisitions and mergers, Jack of All Games expanded by nine further offices in nine different countries between February and October 1999. Following an

outsourcing Outsourcing is an agreement in which one company hires another company to be responsible for a planned or existing activity which otherwise is or could be carried out internally, i.e. in-house, and sometimes involves transferring employees and ...

deal in October 2008, the company was sold to Synnex in February 2010, where it was merged into Synnex' New Age Electronics division.

History

Jack of All Games was founded by David Rosenbaum in 1989, based in

. The company was acquired by Take-Two Interactive on August 25, 1998, for approximately in stock. In February 1999, Take-Two Interactive combined various of their international distribution outlets into Jack of All Games: Alliance Inventory Management (based in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

) became Jack of All Games NY, LDA Distribution (

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

and

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

) became Jack of All Games UK and Jack of All Games France, and Directsoft (

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

) became Jack of All Games Australia. The new offices were followed up by Funsoft Nordic (

Oslo Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of ...

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...

and

Stockholm Stockholm () is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in Sweden by population, largest city of Sweden as well as the List of urban areas in the Nordic countries, largest urban area in Scandinavia. Approximately 980,000 people liv ...

), which was acquired by Take-Two Interactive in March 1999 and subsequently renamed Jack of All Games Scandinavia. An office in

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...

, Germany, was opened on July 1, 1999. Triad Distributors and Global Star Software, respectively a software distributor and a budget-range game publisher, both of which were founded in 1993 by Craig McGauley and Damian Cristiani, and operated under the same management team and from the same facilities in

Concord, Ontario Concord is a suburban industrial district in the City of Vaughan in York Region, located north of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. According to the 2001 Census, Concord has 8,255 residents. It is accessed by two provincial highways: Highway 407 a ...

, were acquired by Take-Two Interactive in September 1999 and combined into Jack of All Games Canada. In October 1999, Take-Two Interactive acquired Italian publisher CD Verte, which became Jack of All Games Italy. On September 9, 2008, Take-Two Interactive announced that, effective immediately, all Jack of All Games operations, including all employees and their West Chester office lease, would be outsourced to Ditan, the distribution arm of

Cinram Cinram International was a Toronto, Canada-based manufacturer of pre-recorded Blu-ray Discs, DVDs, CD-Audio, CD-ROMs, VHS tapes and audio cassettes. It was an affiliate of the Arizona-based Najafi Companies. History Cinram was established in ...

. In October 2008, Robert Alexander, the

president President most commonly refers to: *President (corporate title) *President (education), a leader of a college or university *President (government title) President may also refer to: Automobiles * Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ful ...

of Jack of All Games at the time of its acquisition, filed a complaint with the United States District Court for the District of Nevada against Take-Two Interactive executives Paul Eibler and Richard Roedel, who Alexander alleged had implemented a scheme that procedurally lowered his compensation as a key employee for the company. According to Alexander, the company owed him "a $240,000 salary with guaranteed 20% raises for three years, a $25,000 monthly expense allowance, a $0.50 royalty on each game passed through his distribution chain, and a large chunk of Take-Two stock", due to which was a seeking a total of in damages for

breach of contract Breach of contract is a legal cause of action and a type of civil wrong, in which a binding agreement or bargained-for exchange is not honored by one or more of the parties to the contract by non-performance or interference with the other party ...

. On December 21, 2009, Take-Interactive announced that they had agreed to sell Jack of All Games to Synnex for . According to Ben Feder,

chief executive officer A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

for the company the time, Take-Two Interactive wanted to shift their focus to their "core business strategy"—

video game publishing A video game publisher is a company that publishes video games that have been developed either internally by the publisher or externally by a video game developer. They often finance the development, sometimes by paying a video game developer ...

. The acquisition closed on February 26, 2010, and Jack of All Games was effectively merged into Synnex' New Age Electronics division.

References

{{Take-Two Interactive 1989 establishments in Ohio 1998 mergers and acquisitions 2010 disestablishments in Ohio 2010 mergers and acquisitions Defunct companies based in Ohio Take-Two Interactive divisions and subsidiaries Video game companies disestablished in 2010 Video game companies established in 1989 Defunct video game companies of the United States Video game development companies