Interactive Magic announced Wednesday that it is teaming up with America Online to provide new online titles for AOL' s game channel.

　　"America Online has an audience of 13 million members, and we are very pleased to have a distribution partnership with them," said IMagic chairman "Wild Bill" Stealey. "This is a significant step towards achieving the corporate goals we have set for expanding distribution of games developed by IMagic Online."

　　The first title to be featured is Raider Wars, IMagic Online' s multiplayer space combat simulation, with IMagic promising more in the months and years to come.

　　"This new alliance is beneficial for AOL and their millions of subscribers because of Interactive Magic's reputation for high-quality online games," added Stealey.

　　The deal with AOL has been in the works for some time and is the culmination of IMagic's efforts to expand into the worldwide online gaming market. Recently plans for opening up new gaming servers in Europe and Japan (with one already existing in Germany) have been announced, and with AOL, IMagic is stepping up in the world.

　　It can't be too bad for AOL, either. With the recent exodus of content developers in the past year, AOL will definitely benefit from a long-term relationship with IMagic based on brand-new content, the bulk of which many AOL users have never seen before.

　　"The same award-winning team that developed WarBirds has also been working diligently on Raider Wars," continued Stealey. "But this is only the beginning, Interactive Magic will provide America Online a steady stream of new and exciting content for the Games Channel."