This became known from the second volume of the book Ultimate History of Video Games, excerpts from which have recently appeared online.
As the vice president of Marvel Games Jay Ong recalls, he received his position in 2014. First of all, he tried to find out why the box office success of the company’s films did not affect existing games in the Marvel universe, such as Marvel vs. Capcom.
After a while, Ong decided that the company needed new games. He realized that to do this, he needed to find a publisher partner with an eye to long-term investments, who would be personally interested in working under license. At the same time, he should have “a lot of talented developers, commitment to quality and inexhaustible pockets.”
Three companies came up to the requirements — Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo. But the latter mainly created games based on its IP, so it disappeared. Ong tried to talk to Microsoft, but she also wanted to do her own IP, so Sony turned out to be the only possible candidate.
After successful negotiations with Sony, Ong took the rights to the Spider-Man games from Activision ahead of schedule. In 2018, Insomniac Games studio released Marvel’s Spider-Man.