Microsoft acquires ZeniMax Media (Bethesda, id Software, Arkane + 5 more) [2020-09-21, 2021-03-09]
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There are already 2 exceptions which are PS5 timed-exclusive games. I expect SONY has other agreements with Bethesda about day-1 release or exclusivity.
Microsoft and Sony don't run their console businesses like fanboys. That's why they are still in business!
Some may say that is why their competitor is still alive, because they don't do fanboy-level decisions. If they did, their competitors would be gone.
Some may say that is why their competitor is still alive, because they don't do fanboy-level decisions. If they did, their competitors would be gone.
Fanboy-level decisions probably would've led to war already
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Deleted member 11852
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I reckon Microsoft would need to buy Ubisoft, Activision, Epic, EA, Rockstar and CDPR to really make a dent in the appeal of PlayStation. That really is fanboy fantasy but there is still no guarantee they'd get any kind of return in the near future. Microsoft are always looking at how best to use their money and diving deep into videogames is a risk compared to investing more in their cloud infrastructure.Some may say that is why their competitor is still alive, because they don't do fanboy-level decisions. If they did, their competitors would be gone.
$7.5bn feels like a lot, and sure it's more than most people in this forum will ever manage, but it's small for Microsoft. I mean they paid more than than for Skype and Skype for Business is EOL next year!
There is really in the "take a punt" zone.I reckon Microsoft would need to buy Ubisoft, Activision, Epic, EA, Rockstar and CDPR to really make a dent in the appeal of PlayStation. That really is fanboy fantasy but there is still no guarantee they'd get any kind of return in the near future. Microsoft are always looking at how best to use their money and diving deep into videogames is a risk compared to investing more in their cloud infrastructure.
$7.5bn feels like a lot, and sure it's more than most people in this forum will ever manage, but it's small for Microsoft. I mean they paid more than than for Skype and Skype for Business is EOL next year!
ehhh...Microsoft just buying EA or Ubisoft at this point would cause significant problems for competitors imo....
Not gonna happen though
Tkumpathenurpahl
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$7.5bn feels like a lot, and sure it's more than most people in this forum will ever manage, but it's small for Microsoft. I mean they paid more than than for Skype and Skype for Business is EOL next year!
That's depressing. A Gregg's vegan sausage roll is the only thing in recent memory to be in "take a punt" territory.
They don't need an EA or Ubisoft. EA is 38.15B market cap I doubt that will ever happen. Ubi is 10.23B Euro around 12B USD. That could happen. I could see the Division as a big Gamepass title in the future a GAS FPS for them. I'm not really into Ubisoft games myself. I loved Ghost recon when the xbox 360 launched but haven't played it since since my old gaming group fell apart during the end of the 360 years. But the price sounds right for one of the purchases i heard about. I also heard about another cheaper one and then a few that don't even break 1B.
For Microsoft they now have a lot of teams and talent and by the end of this generation they will grow each of those teams into more teams.
I reckon Microsoft would need to buy Ubisoft, Activision, Epic, EA, Rockstar and CDPR to really make a dent in the appeal of PlayStation. That really is fanboy fantasy but there is still no guarantee they'd get any kind of return in the near future. Microsoft are always looking at how best to use their money and diving deep into videogames is a risk compared to investing more in their cloud infrastructure.
$7.5bn feels like a lot, and sure it's more than most people in this forum will ever manage, but it's small for Microsoft. I mean they paid more than than for Skype and Skype for Business is EOL next year!
Yea but Skype is the core of Teams now. That technology platform allowed them to out compete slack. The main reason slack isn't doing well is because it hasn't had a video conferencing platform
Teams personal is going to be up and running soon and for most skype users they will just go to that
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If Skype is the core of Teams why is there no interoperability between them? It surely isn't Microsoft's strategy to have two platforms built on the sam tech that cannot communicate with each other.
I think he's saying here that:He didn't answer it. The easiest thing in the world, which I'm sure would a) please Xbox owners and b) increase interest/adoption of Microsoft platforms right before they launch two new ones, would have been for Phil Spencer to state categorically that future Zenimax studio games will release only on Windows and Xbox.
But he's still not committing to that - it may not even be his decision. He is the head of Xbox but when it comes to strategic decisions where tens/hundreds of millions of dollars are at stake - by deciding not to release on PlayStation and/or Switch and/or any other platform, that may be a decision that is required to go to the Board. Because they represent the investors whose money and investment this acquisition is. It's not a plaything, it's people's money here.It may depend on Xbox's profitability and outlooks at the time these decisions need to be made.
Microsoft and Sony don't run their console businesses like fanboys. That's why they are still in business!
a) to recoup the cost of purchasing Zenimax studios, if he kept it exclusive it would cover the cost of the purchase
but
b) if he were to sell it to other platforms they would profit significantly more
so the question is just going to come down to, if they want to make exceptions, or what the general strategy is going to be for that year or going forward.
Leaving it open ended is the right thing to do. They have forecasts of where they should land, but if they aren't meeting expectations and they want to fill a gap, they have options.
Hence why Skype is coming up on EOL
Here is what we need to answer
How much money sony or nintendo take as a platform holder.
What ever cut they have to sell that much more to bring it to parity vs their own platforms. Then you have to factor in the loss of an exclusive title as a selling point to buy a console.
Also Elder scroll games are games people invest hundreds of hours into. Something like that can be a game pass selling feature
Johnny Awesome
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I still favor the Sony denial strategy for MS if it were my decision. Denying Ubisoft games to Sony doesn't really hurt Sony that much. Buying Square Enix would though. Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, and Tomb Raider day one on GamePass is the right strategy. Sony fan tears would drown the world if that happened.
Other than Sony 1st party, there's nothing of more worldwide importance than SE games on PS IMO. Sony would bid the price up though. They could never let this happen for only 8B.
Other than Sony 1st party, there's nothing of more worldwide importance than SE games on PS IMO. Sony would bid the price up though. They could never let this happen for only 8B.
there are pros and cons to both of them.
Sony loosing Assassin's creed , watchdog , Farcry would be big. MS could also reboot Ghost Recon which was a big xbox / 360 era franchise. They also get the rest of the Clancy stuff. Then they get a bunch of small stuff like Trails , rayman , driver. Then there is stuff like the Might and magic series and warlords that i would love to see come back in a bigger form.
Its also much better for game pass.
In 2019 Ubisoft released in total 23 titles across mobile , streaming , and console (i'm not recounting stuff like Ghost recon breakpoint being on windows/ps4/one as 3 titles. Its just one)
Square enix released just 9 titles ascross platforms including web browser
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That doesn't answer my question. You maintain that Skype is at the core of Teams but that isn't my understanding, they seem to be built on different tech stacks. But if you are correct why can't I use Microsoft Teams to connect with somebody using Skype on a platform that Teams may not be on?
It's been 30% for always. The whole Apple-Epic-Google antitrust has cast a light on digital storefronts and it's 30% across the board. So what you're missing is the scenic number of console sales but it's not unreasonable to assume the it's roughly proportionate to the split of the user base of consoles, is at the 2:1 PS4:Xbox rationalities, around 33.3% on Xbox, around 66.6% on PlayStation.
Suppose I an a fan of Fallout and Elder Scrolls, and other RPGs which people are known or playing hundreds if not thousands of hours, if I am on a budget then I'm waiting to buy that once on sale and not paying Microsoft $$$ every month. GamePass's appeal is definitely in it's breadth of games available, it's great value for those who play a variety of games, not those who play one or two games for months and months.
If you look at Ubisoft's finances, you'll see Far Cry, Assassin's Creed and Watch Dogs are big profitable franchises. AC Odyssey is easily a 100+ hour game. I've never been able to get into Final Fantasy beyond XII Zodiac Age, but for me Final Fantasy is another Fallout or Elder Scrolls scenario. If I had to pay the platform holder every month to continue to playing it, it begins to look real bad value if that's mostly what I'm playing and by paying, I mean mindlessly grinding ;-)
But I do agree, spending $7.5bn on acquiring a publisher and not having their future output by fully or partially exclusive to your platform, does seem weird. But not much about what Microsoft is doing with Xbox makes a lot of sense financially - or at least it looks that way. There's no insight into Xbox finances like there is with Nintendo and Sony. They current strategies may well only be about growing their platforms, with a plan to pivot a bit and monetise in another way down the line ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Rockstar?
This is also my take. They're keeping their options open, which is smart. At any junction in time a game may be exclusive or it may not. It would save Microsoft a lot of dev time if they knew this in advance, i.e. they don't really want to spend 3-4 years developing a game on Xbox and PS5 only to decide down the line not to publish on PS5 - it also makes all the marketing in the 18 months prior to launch more complex if you're undecided what you're going to do.
because Microsoft did not design it that way. A lot of skype is inside teams but they aren't fully the same thing. MS doesn't want to continue support of skype because it comes with a lot of baggage. They want a clean break from the actual end user client and a lot of technologies that were in use from prior to the purchase of skype
I
Thats the current split , that doesn't assume the split will be the same with the ps5 and xbox series .
Or you can go out and get an xbox series s all access with 2 years of game pass . Have a next gen experiance for what was it $25 a month ? Get a high end next gen experiance for $35 a month with the series x. All while enjoying hundreds of other games.
Or again you can just pay for game pass and play it on your phone or tablet (or both) and soon your windows pc and then anything with a web browser and most likely at some point tvs with streaming built in.
MS seem to have a good enough relationship with Nintendo. I would assume if we see these titles show up anywhere it will be a on a Nintendo console a few years after they launch.
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I expect the retailer cut will change only when there is pressure applied and we'd definitely be hearing about like as we have with Epic, Apple and Google. Microsoft and Sony would be foolish to voluntarily surrender profit. No no-profit company would do this. If it changes, we'll hear about it because it'll be massive. If it drops, the store front will use at a marketing point like Epic did with EGS.
You're obviously not somebody on a budget because $25-35 a month is a lot of money to a lot of people. GamePass is great if you know that you will never have to cancel that subscription due to financial woes, because then you basically have no games.
I'm certain some future Zenimax will appear on Switch but many won't. Todd Howard stated BGS's next game Starfield is being built for next gen and I'm sure future Elder Scrolls and Fallout games will be too. I think Doom has done pretty well on Switch.
cheapchips
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He was a bit ambiguous as to whether it would reach current gen systems, back when it was announced anyway.
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In the Eurogamer article, they asked Todd Howard what he meant by "next generation game" and he confirmed that meant both hardware and software. Switch is more lastgen than current gen, which I'm guessing is why it runs Skyrim but not Fallout 4, even though Skyrim SE is closer to Fallout 4's version of the Creation engine than it is to 2012's Skyrim Creation engine. Switch would make for a great Fallout 3 Remastered platform though!
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