In a surprise move, Electronic Arts is sucking up 19.9 percent of Ubisoft s stock. The Dutch holding company for a billionaire television producer agreed to sell their stock to EA for $85 to $100 million. The deal can t go through until U.S. regulators approve it. Judging by the comments of the Dutch firm representatives, they believe selling their shares to EA will help lead to future collaboration in television programming with EA. This can only be bad for the industry: not only is EA buying up all of the small gaming companies, now they re taking chunks out of one of their only real competitors. Looks like were headed toward a world according to EA.

Electronic Arts to Buy 20 percent Stake in Ubisoft [Wall Street Journal]