Microsoft rumored to be buying...... [2020-04, 2020-07, 2020-11]

[Inuhanyou]

We dont live in a free market society.

The thing that scares me most about this corporate dystopia we live in is how much you can monopolize by having the inherent power and influence to do so.

Dont laugh at me.

Its possibly just me, but i happen to not want the game industry to become like the movie industry and have a majority owned by a single monopolistic entity. That is why i dislike these kinds of wholesale buyouts.

Im not against deal making. If you want a mutuallty beneficial deal for a game or franchise where two parties win thats fine but this kind of thing along with sonys rumored interest in leyou technologies is altogether different.

If i had my way when parent companies want to dissolve the individual teams would own themselves until they decided to either stay independent like bungie or individually look for buyouts.

 

[fehu]

Microsoft has just acquired a studio specifically to create an internal division dedicated to building their version of android for mobiles.
People asked Microsoft to port cshell and windows for arm to Duo, they responded reinforcing their effort on a competing os.
I don't know how ip will work, but if there's someone willing to shit on their own product and publish on competing consoles, it's microsoft.

 

[AzBat]

See Minecraft. They don't have a problem continuing multiplatform games after purchase, but I love how it's OK for Sony to make Spider-man exclusive for PlayStation, but it's not OK for Microsoft to do the same with Batman. MS has a great service in Game Pass and if they decided to make Batman exclusive for Game Pass I have no problem with it. Maybe they could make up for that exclusive Batman content PlayStation got. Would be nice for the shoe to be on other foot for once. LOL

Tommy McClain

 

[cheapchips]

"Taking away" games from other platforms isn't how Phil Spencer sees studio acquisitions. At least not publicly. He may be a cackling megalomaniac behind closed doors...

 

[fehu]

Sony is in a different position on spiderman due to precedent oppressive contracts. For marvel to use their own character in their own movie they had to make an arrangement with sony.
At the moment basically sony owns spiderman on movies and games.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

See Minecraft. They don't have a problem continuing multiplatform games after purchase, but I love how it's OK for Sony to make Spider-man exclusive for PlayStation, but it's not OK for Microsoft to do the same with Batman.

It's OK for both companies to do this.

To the best of my knowledge Spider-Man (the IP) isn't defacto exclusive to PlayStation, i.e. Sony licensed the Spider-Man IP to make a game for their console and I've seen nothing to suggest that Sony licensing Spider-Man for their game would preclude Microsoft from licensing Spider-Man for an Xbox game. They just didn't. Microsoft may licence Batman for a game they develop for Xbox (and Windows), which likely as not would not preclude Sony from licensing the IP for their own Batman game should they chose to do so.

That sort of defacto exclusivity is something IP holders usually wish to avoid, you never want to reduce the scope of who your brand can reach and for both console platforms, that's tens of millions of consumers, many of whom sit in that demographic where these types of IPs appeal.

 

[eastmen]

The limited amount of original IP seems like an issue longer term. Can't read The Information article, but the CNBC article from June said that WB were looking to gain ongoing revenue from licencing. Seems like licencing will be a tricky balance for both parties. The purchaser won't want to be on the hook for recurring fees and WB want recurring fees.

MS would just be buying the licensing rights for a bit. There is a rumored batman game in the works and mad max. So I would think those licensing would have to go over to MS for awhile so they could release the games already in the process of being made. So in my mind i would think MS would have access to the licensing for x amount of years as part of the purchase price so they can release those games and other projects in the works. I think that goes for any of the buyers in all honesty.

I think for MS getting another what is it 8 teams from WB to make games is another 8 games that can be in production a year. If we assume a 2 year dev cycle on the majority of games thats another 4 games a year they can release a year

 

[AzBat]

It's OK for both companies to do this.

To the best of my knowledge Spider-Man (the IP) isn't defacto exclusive to PlayStation, i.e. Sony licensed the Spider-Man IP to make a game for their console and I've seen nothing to suggest that Sony licensing Spider-Man for their game would preclude Microsoft from licensing Spider-Man for an Xbox game. They just didn't. Microsoft may licence Batman for a game they develop for Xbox (and Windows), which likely as not would not preclude Sony from licensing the IP for their own Batman game should they chose to do so.

That sort of defacto exclusivity is something IP holders usually wish to avoid, you never want to reduce the scope of who your brand can reach and for both console platforms, that's tens of millions of consumers, many of whom sit in that demographic where these types of IPs appeal.

SMH Microsoft chose this! It's their fault! I thought I had read it all here. What is it? Spider-Man is exclusive to PlayStation or not? No need to define a new version of "exclusive". IP holders are not avoiding exclusivity. In fact, it seems they're all doubling down on it.

Tommy McClain

 

[Jay]

"Taking away" games from other platforms isn't how Phil Spencer sees studio acquisitions. At least not publicly. He may be a cackling megalomaniac behind closed doors...

True but....
The outerworlds 2 was confirmed as exclusive from what I remember.
If a game is already in development for other platforms he wont stop it.
Doesn't mean future games will be on competing platforms though.
Think it also depends on what the game is from now on.

 

[eastmen]

Microsoft has released titles on other platforms. I think it was more of the fact that Minecraft was on every platform so they continued that support. They paid a few billion for it so that was the quickest return on investment. The same with outer worlds. it was already late into development so why wouldn't they take that quick cash. If anything the game getting more eyeballs on it makes it a stronger exclusive in the future. They have even put titles on other platforms like Gears 5 on steam. I think they have said they will stop that however which makes sense as the xbox pc app and mercury and griffin are far into their reworks so they will want to start attracting people there. But I would think with Warner Brothers they would want to just put out titles far into development on multiple platforms. Again a quick way to maximize the return on investment. They make later games in the series exclusive.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

See Minecraft. They don't have a problem continuing multiplatform games after purchase, but I love how it's OK for Sony to make Spider-man exclusive for PlayStation, but it's not OK for Microsoft to do the same with Batman.

Okay according to whom? Pretty sure you mean 'the internet' where you'll actually find lots of differing opinions. And obviously, PS owners outnumbering XB owners 2:1, the majority expressing self-interest will voice they aren't fussed by SM being exclusive to the platform they own. I for one am not in favour of major IPs like these being single platform and it'll be bad for gamers if more and more deals are brokered. Same as ridiculous movie format wars and having to buy a machine of a particular format to get particular films.

Minecraft is a bit of an outlier in this discussion because it's a GAAS and MS couldn't alienate their extensive userbase. A new title however could be platform exclusive. If 1) this acquisition is true and 2) MS get the rights to the DC games somehow and 3) will make Batman platform exclusive to XBPC, there wouldn't be the same pressure to bring it to other platforms but they would of course get the backs up of PS owning Batman fans.

 

[Inuhanyou]

See Minecraft. They don't have a problem continuing multiplatform games after purchase, but I love how it's OK for Sony to make Spider-man exclusive for PlayStation, but it's not OK for Microsoft to do the same with Batman. MS has a great service in Game Pass and if they decided to make Batman exclusive for Game Pass I have no problem with it. Maybe they could make up for that exclusive Batman content PlayStation got. Would be nice for the shoe to be on other foot for once. LOL

Tommy McClain

Stop looking at this from a silly console warrior lense of who gets to have an exclusive superhero game. Spiderman was a deal for a single ip game series that marvel and sony both agreed on.(which as shifty said doesnt stop spiderman being used in other games)


Its different from MSs deep.pockets literlally buying the entirety of WB games. Thats fucking ridiculous and no first party pub should have that kind of monopoly on gaming as an inherent advantage.

I dont have an issue if ms wants to make a deal with dc for exclusive superman game or whatever, but what we are talking about isnt that

 

[eastmen]

Stop looking at this from a silly console warrior lense of who gets to have an exclusive superhero game. Spiderman was a deal for a single ip game series that marvel and sony both agreed on. Its different from MSs deep.pockets literally buying the entirety of WB games. Thats fucking ridiculous and no first party pub should have that kind of monopoly on gaming

Sony has IP rights to Spiderman Movies and i believe games and they had merch rights also. The recent deal with Disney switched up some of the rights they had in exchange for others.


MS buying all of WB gaming is not any different than Sony buying a studio. When Sony buys a studio they get all that IP also. WB deal would likely be a limited time License to the IP vs a blanket own situation. But I don't see a way any company would buy WB gaming and then have to kill a batman game that may be a year away from completion or a super man game or insert WB ip. Most likely it would be a 10 year IP license to release games and sequels to the game. Perhaps also something in the contract allowing the buyer first right of refusal to renegotiate after the period ends.

No company is going to spend billions on development studios and kill a bunch of games just to make some fans happy. Like I said if MS did buy this company the games that were already late into development for multi console will still get released. After spending 2B or whatever it ends up being your not going to kill easy sources of revenue. MS would likely release those games on all platforms to recoup as much money from the purchase as possible. It would be the games that follow that might become exclusive. After all if one of the multiplatform games are a huge break out hit and everyone plays it on all the platforms the sequel being on a single platform or in MS"s case pc / xbox would draw a lot of people to Microsoft's eco system.

If Sony were to buy them it might be a different matter. They haven't been very open to releasing games on multiple platforms .

 

[cheapchips]

Stop looking at this from a silly console warrior lense of who gets to have an exclusive superhero game. Spiderman was a deal for a single ip game series that marvel and sony both agreed on.(which as shifty said doesnt stop spiderman being used in other games)


Its different from MSs deep.pockets literlally buying the entirety of WB games. Thats fucking ridiculous and no first party pub should have that kind of monopoly on gaming as an inherent advantage.

I dont have an issue if ms wants to make a deal with dc for exclusive superman game or whatever, but what we are talking about isnt that

Looking at the last year on their wiki entry, the internally develop games for the last 12 months were Mortal Kombat 11, The Lego Movie 2 Videogame, Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga. That's hardly gobbling up a huge section of the market for whoever purchases the studios.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Sony has IP rights to Spiderman Movies and i believe games and they had merch rights also.

And generally speaking that's been bad for the IP, same as Fox buying the rights to XMen and stopping good XMen films being made.

MS buying all of WB gaming is not any different than Sony buying a studio. When Sony buys a studio they get all that IP also.

It's somewhat different in that the IPs exist outside of games, so reach a far wider audience - there's a difference of scale between acquiring a game studio and acquiring a large media brand. Sony buying Insomniac may lock R&C games out from other platforms (bad example, Insomniac have been virtually first party for decades!) but that's only an issue among gamers who have heard about R&C and care for it. Sony grabbing Spider-Man locks out all SM fans who don't have a PS, including movie fans and comic fans and animated series fans. So if MS bought the rights to all DC games, and they kept them exclusive, that'd be a far wider audience impacted than if they buy, say, Bungie.

That said, I seriously doubt any such DC IP rights exclusivity rights. It's bad for the brand. The SM game wasn't a lock-out but a title deal with Marvel. Marvel will be looking at the success of that and wondering how to monetise their gaming IPs better. Maybe they'll go shopping for studios themselves, or maybe they'll tender out their IPs more (like Iron-Man VR).

 

[Inuhanyou]

Looking at the last year on their wiki entry, the internally develop games for the last 12 months were Mortal Kombat 11, The Lego Movie 2 Videogame, Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga. That's hardly gobbling up a huge section of the market for whoever purchases the studios.

Thats just the games that released in the last year. Thats a very weird cutting up of the context of what games wb releases

Sony has IP rights to Spiderman Movies and i believe games and they had merch rights also. The recent deal with Disney switched up some of the rights they had in exchange for others.


MS buying all of WB gaming is not any different than Sony buying a studio. When Sony buys a studio they get all that IP also. WB deal would likely be a limited time License to the IP vs a blanket own situation. But I don't see a way any company would buy WB gaming and then have to kill a batman game that may be a year away from completion or a super man game or insert WB ip. Most likely it would be a 10 year IP license to release games and sequels to the game. Perhaps also something in the contract allowing the buyer first right of refusal to renegotiate after the period ends.

No company is going to spend billions on development studios and kill a bunch of games just to make some fans happy. Like I said if MS did buy this company the games that were already late into development for multi console will still get released. After spending 2B or whatever it ends up being your not going to kill easy sources of revenue. MS would likely release those games on all platforms to recoup as much money from the purchase as possible. It would be the games that follow that might become exclusive. After all if one of the multiplatform games are a huge break out hit and everyone plays it on all the platforms the sequel being on a single platform or in MS"s case pc / xbox would draw a lot of people to Microsoft's eco system.

If Sony were to buy them it might be a different matter. They haven't been very open to releasing games on multiple platforms .

So your arguments are sony and disney hashing out a deal for a single use property in spiderman for movie rights they have owned for 20 years and a single game franchise is equavalent to buying the entirety of WB games on a whim and also dont worry because MS would release be courteous enough to release games already in development on the platforms they were originally going to anyway?

How does that address anything i said.

If its purely a battle between money and who can own everything the fastest with pure clout, by default there is only one winner in this scenario, and its not consumers nor is it anyone but MS because they by default have the most power with the ability to exersize it.

As someone who sees every other aspect of society and entertainment becoming centralized, its bad.

 

[eastmen]

And generally speaking that's been bad for the IP, same as Fox buying the rights to XMen and stopping good XMen films being made.

It's somewhat different in that the IPs exist outside of games, so reach a far wider audience - there's a difference of scale between acquiring a game studio and acquiring a large media brand. Sony buying Insomniac may lock R&C games out from other platforms (bad example, Insomniac have been virtually first party for decades!) but that's only an issue among gamers who have heard about R&C and care for it. Sony grabbing Spider-Man locks out all SM fans who don't have a PS, including movie fans and comic fans and animated series fans. So if MS bought the rights to all DC games, and they kept them exclusive, that'd be a far wider audience impacted than if they buy, say, Bungie.

That said, I seriously doubt any such DC IP rights exclusivity rights. It's bad for the brand. The SM game wasn't a lock-out but a title deal with Marvel. Marvel will be looking at the success of that and wondering how to monetise their gaming IPs better. Maybe they'll go shopping for studios themselves, or maybe they'll tender out their IPs more (like Iron-Man VR).

I'm not sure what your trying to say?

Sony bought the rights to Spiderman for movies back in the early 90s when marvel was bankrupt. It allowed Marvel to stay afloat. We got the Sam Rami movie trilogy out of it which is still the best movie versions.
Fox got the x-men rights at the same time for the same reason and we eneded up with the first 2 x-men movies that were great.

It may be a larger audience but that just means its a better deal for MS. 8 or so new studios for them some with such great games like the batman series or shadow of war. The ip licensing would be the cherry on top


As for Marvel both them and Fox are owned by Disney so those non spiderman marvel IPs are locked behind Disney liscensing deals. Expect to see more stuff out of EA

 

[Deleted member 11852]

SMH Microsoft chose this! It's their fault! I thought I had read it all here. What is it? Spider-Man is exclusive to PlayStation or not? No need to define a new version of "exclusive". IP holders are not avoiding exclusivity. In fact, it seems they're all doubling down on it.

Maybe I didn't explain this well. There is the Spider-Man IP and Insomniac's Spider-Man game for PS4.

Spider-Man (the IP) is not exclusive to PlayStation. Insomniac's Spider-Man (the game) is exclusive to PlayStation because Sony chose to develop the game only for their console. Anybody, including Microsoft, can licence this IP - subject to what I assume is a long list of Marvel IP restrictions - and make games for Xbox or Switch or PC. But just because Sony made a game for PS4 (and not Xbox) does not make the Spider-Man IP (not the game, the IP) exclusive.

Marvel could have insisted that Sony make Spider-Man game for all consoles and they probably would have. This is what happened with Sony's MLB The Show licence and why Sony will develop that game series for PlayStation, Xbox and Switch from next year.

You follow? Microsoft may licence Batman for games they'll only develop for Xbox and Windows, but that wouldn't make the Batman IP exclusive to Xbox/Windows, only those games.

MS buying all of WB gaming is not any different than Sony buying a studio. When Sony buys a studio they get all that IP also. WB deal would likely be a limited time License to the IP vs a blanket own situation.

And that's the differece, when you buy a company/studio you get the IP they own, but not necessarily the IP that have licensed. The terms of the IP licence may allow the IP to transfer to the buyer, or it may not.

If Sony were to buy them it might be a different matter. They haven't been very open to releasing games on multiple platforms.

The IP licensor has a lot of power. As I linked above Sony's MLB The Show licence continuing was predicated on Sony developing Xbox and Switch versions from next year. And Sony are doing that to keep the licence so it seems they are open to doing this, but if we accept the purpose of system exclusives is make make a system appeal more than a competitor's system, it's wouldn't make sense to do this for all of your IP.

edit: If Microsoft want to make more money from selling Halo, they could develop and release the Master Chief Collection for PS4. There is a reason they won't.

 

[eastmen]

Thats just the games that released in the last year. Thats a very weird cutting up of the context of what games wb releases



So your arguments are sony and disney hashing out a deal for a single use property in spiderman for movie rights they have owned for 20 years and a single game franchise is equavalent to buying the entirety of WB games on a whim and also dont worry because MS would release be courteous enough to release games already in development on the platforms they were originally going to anyway?

How does that address anything i said.

If its purely a battle between money and who can own everything the fastest with pure clout, by default there is only one winner in this scenario, and its not consumers nor is it anyone but MS because they by default have the most power with the ability to exersize it.

As someone who sees every other aspect of society and entertainment becoming centralized, its bad.

I don't see the difference. Spiderman is a huge IP. At any time a company can go out and buy exclusive rights to any IP they find may have value . WB gaming sounds to be up for sale. There are multiple companies out there that want to buy it. If ms buys it thats good for them

Remember if MS buys them you can play it on a pc as well as a console.

 

[cheapchips]

Thats just the games that released in the last year. Thats a very weird cutting up of the context of what games wb releases

Seemed a more sensible than taking every game they've ever developed. The real context to my mind is that they release 1-2 internally developed AAA titles a year. Given the truly vast array of games available every year, a platform holder purchasing WB isn't going to destroy player choice. Unless you really really must play the latest Lego game...

(I've nothing against Lego games!)