Microsoft acquired Activision Blizzard King for $69 Billion on 2023-10-13
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Johnny Awesome
Veteran
CMA's desperate attempt to save face isn't fooling me. They and the FTC just never had a leg to stand on. Even though neither were acting in the interests of consumers, they finally stepped aside. It's better for gamers that Sony not completely dominate the industry. This will level the playing field somewhat.
Silent_Buddha
Legend
I do find it interesting that while the CMA purports to be about fostering competition in the virtually non-existent cloud gaming space, the EU ruling actually does far more to promote that than the CMA's solution.
Heck, we saw many cloud gaming providers come out to talk about how great the deal was after the EU approved it with concessions. Not currently seeing any cloud gaming companies cheering on the CMA ruling as they did with the EU ruling.
The EU ruling required MS to allow any cloud gaming service the right to stream any ABK game that a subscriber to their service owns. So, presumably if X player owned the latest COD, they could steam it on any service within the EU and MS can't block it.
So, the CMA deal just trades one controlling entity for another but doesn't have the same wording (AFAIK) as the EU that explicitly has the controlling entity allow smaller cloud service providers the right to stream ABK games if a subscriber owns said game. IE - if UBIsoft wanted, they could just keep the service exclusive to their own cloud service (UBISoft+ cloud gaming). So the deal doesn't necessarily provide for more competition. It's still controlled by an entity that has a vested interest in keeping those games on its own service, it just happens to be not Microsoft in the UK.
The EU deal seems to be significantly better WRT actually attempting to help smaller cloud gaming services compete.
Regards,
SB
Heck, we saw many cloud gaming providers come out to talk about how great the deal was after the EU approved it with concessions. Not currently seeing any cloud gaming companies cheering on the CMA ruling as they did with the EU ruling.
The EU ruling required MS to allow any cloud gaming service the right to stream any ABK game that a subscriber to their service owns. So, presumably if X player owned the latest COD, they could steam it on any service within the EU and MS can't block it.
So, the CMA deal just trades one controlling entity for another but doesn't have the same wording (AFAIK) as the EU that explicitly has the controlling entity allow smaller cloud service providers the right to stream ABK games if a subscriber owns said game. IE - if UBIsoft wanted, they could just keep the service exclusive to their own cloud service (UBISoft+ cloud gaming). So the deal doesn't necessarily provide for more competition. It's still controlled by an entity that has a vested interest in keeping those games on its own service, it just happens to be not Microsoft in the UK.
The EU deal seems to be significantly better WRT actually attempting to help smaller cloud gaming services compete.
Regards,
SB
Whatever his severance package is, it won't come close to the value of the millions of ATVI shares MS just bought from him.
Johnny Awesome
Veteran
Looks like the mob didn't have their way with Bobby after all. Maybe one day there'll be some evidence to back up all those claims against him.
Actually that's worldwide less the EU. So not just UK. Microsoft has to license the cloud rights in the UK, US, Japan, etc. Other than that yes, just trading one entity for another & not as good for consumers as the EU. Here in the US I will probably only be able access the cloud versions via the Xbox & UbiSoft apps. Doubt any other cloud service will pay UbiSoft for the access.
Johnny Awesome
Veteran
D
Deleted member 11852
Guest
Yeah, the way most multinationals are structured, it's pretty damn difficult to isolate one county in Europe from others, much like how Canada and the US are generally dealt as a single region (North America). And many multinationals have a EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Asia) region so any accommodations made in one country in Europe tends to ripple wider.
Johnny Awesome
Veteran
Johnny Awesome
Veteran
Phil has taken Xbox Game Studios from 2000 developers to almost 22,000 in the last 6 years.
one of the creators of the Xbox gave a piece of his mind on Bobby Kotick
Riddlewire
Regular
It sounds like Bobby Kotick went to the same CEO Training Academy as Bob Iger.
My question is how do they plan to sustain so many studios when the aim is to keep AAA MP franchises exclusive? They must believe a lot that PC and XBOX are enough to sustain them
I suppose it comes down to how well gamepass and streaming can spread outside of consoles. The latter is more difficult, but PC gamepass is a fairly large market.
Johnny Awesome
Veteran
Exactly. They'll put just enough stuff on PS to bankroll Xbox and PC Game Pass games. I believe that Sony insisting on CoD was actually a mistake for Sony. Phil WANTS more MS games on other systems. Not all (Starfied), but more.
cheapchips
Veteran
Xbox splash screen one of the biggest annual PS titles. Must be worth a few $$.
D
Deleted member 11852
Guest
In the short term. The EU has long had a myopia with long-term repercussions, which is perhaps something to do with the institution not having been around very long itself. Technologies like cloud delivery march slowly towards a tech delivery pivot then accelerate. The challenge is predicting the pivot.
If you're looking backwards to anticipate the future, then from the early commercial cloud solutions, you find Gaikai. Originally financed by Intel in 2008, bought by Sony in 2012, then it's easy to look at the lack of market penetration and conclude that the future is far off. In the EU as a whole, where telecoms infrastructure is good in some places, and bad in most places, that might be true. In the UK? Not so much.
A lot of small companies who are trying to survive the next 24 months, so a commitment for the next ten years is significant for them.
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