THQ partners with Joyent, WWE Facebook game on the horizon?

THQ, the developer behind critically acclaimed franchises like Red Faction and the World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) series of games, is inching closer to social game creation with today's partnership with cloud-computing company Joyent.

The same group behind LinkedIn's could servers as well as social game developer Kabam!, Joyent will take a burden off of THQ's development teams to focus more on creating games than maintaining servers, according to Forbes. However, the developer doesn't seem interested in creating Facebook games based off of original ideas.

"So a Facebook game could easily be just a marketing tool as well," THQ vice president of online publishing and operations Mike Hogan said to GamesIndustry.biz. "Quite likely it's going to be some combination of revenue producing venture and something's that going to try to build brand awareness and bring people into... the core game."

So, if THQ is looking to Facebook as more of a potential brand extension--which we know it has before--for its traditional games than a full-blown platform, what can we expect to see from THQ on the social network? Wrestling season is just around the corner with WWE SmackDown Vs. Raw 2011 set to release October 26, 2010. This could mean a Facebook game promoting one of their most profitable brands is coming sooner than later.

With Red Faction: Armageddon--THQ's other currently popular brand--pushed back to 2011, it's only logical that if we're to see a THQ -made Facebook game this year that it will almost definitely be a WWE game.

Hogan stressed to Forbes that, "We've got some great brands with us, and when you take a look at expanding that to the social platform, it's possible that some of these could be big hits."

This practice isn't too different from EA Sports' approach to their FIFA Superstars and Madden NFL Superstars Facebook games, one of which that's directly linked with the demo of their upcoming game. It's not out of the realm of possibility for another developer to try the same strategy. In fact, with a brand like WWE, it would be absolutely bonkers for THQ to pass this up.

Would you like to see a WWE Facebook game? Can THQ get it right and have it compete with MMA Pro Fighter? Sound off in the comments. Add Comment.