Beenox swarming Spider-Man franchise

Treyarch is now known as one of the elite studios handling Activision's billion-dollar Call of Duty franchise, having crafted 2005's Big Red One, Call of Duty 3, World at War, and Black Ops. Prior to hitting the big time, though, the studio had since 2001 handled Activision's Spider-Man line of games. Now, Activision has named a new studio to fill those shoes.

Activision announced today that it has charged its internal studio Beenox with lead development duties on all upcoming Spider-Man titles. The studio, which is situated in Quebec City, Canada, formed in 2000 and was acquired by Activision in 2005. It currently houses more than 170 employees, all of which, the publisher notes, are working on future, as-yet-unannounced Spider-Man titles.

Beenox's tenure helming the Spider-Man franchise could potentially be quite long. Though Spider-Man creator Marvel Publishing is now owned by Disney, Activision secured the rights to the comics kingpin's webslinger through 2017.

Beenox's first crack as lead developer on the franchise actually came last year with Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions, which received a positive critical reception. The studio has primarily played a support role for Activision in the past, having crafted the PC editions of such titles as Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4, X-Men: The Official Game, and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Beenox was also the lead developer on Guitar Hero: Smash Hits.