Microsoft acquired Activision Blizzard King for $69 Billion on 2023-10-13
- Thread starter Rangers
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It's all still Internal FTC Process Judge.
Inuhanyou
Veteran
The issue is that it's not about individual exclusive games having deals associated with them. MS and Nintendo both do this and it's been a standard of the console experience from the beginning.
Hell Nintendo literally just ended a contract with monster hunter rise being exclusive to their console for x amount of months.
But entire pubs being swallowed is an entirely different thing that should not be allowed to set a precedent. I don't know why people are so willfully ignorant about what people are actually mad at simply to defend MS when this is bigger than MS. Isolating anyones actual complaints down to "lol fanboys" is really annoying.
They don't have the money to do it, but Sony or Nintendo swallowing Capcom, square enix or namco bandai and making all of the IP they produce exclusive to their ecosystem outside of "arbitrary legacy titles" would not benefit anyone in the industry besides Sony or Nimtendo. And the other console pubs with an incentive to keep all the third party publishers independent and available for all gaming ecosystems would be right to criticize them or attempt to stop such deals.
Some people would be complaining, but that would be a small minority compared to what's happening now if MS was making the same kind of exclusive game deals Sony or Nintendo are instead of simply grabbing entire industry publishers and eating them, and calling themselves charitable for making some franchises available to other consoles for a few years.
And MS wouldent be in a legal battle either in that situation. But because it is a 69 billion dollar attempted financing, it gets scrutiny on that level.
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iceberg187
Regular
The dollar amount this transaction is worth is immaterial. Always has been, it's just what people want to fixate on. The question needing to be answered is what the landscape looks like after the acquisition take place. Publisher/Developer. It's all the same. If it does not move the needle in terms of market share to an overwhelming fashion, then the purchase should be a go. What people need to understand is that Playstation ≠ gaming. It is a place but not the place to play games. No platform or patron of games is owed the same game/franchise in perpetuity on their platform of choice, especially if the ownership of the property changes hands or the winds of change indicates this is the way the business needs to be ran. You could get Madden on the SNES, can't get it on the Switch, even though it is one of the most successful consoles ever and I'm sure there are enough people to justify the port/changes needed to accomplish it. Same of Call of Duty. I've wanted a new F-Zero for 20 years now. I make due with the games that similar to its ilk like a Wipeout, Redout or even Fast RMX on my Switch. They've done that and now they are being told that they are competing 'in the wrong way?' In the case of Activision, most of these games are still going to be everywhere. Not to mention, Activision was sitting on a bunch of IP that were never going to see the light of day again. At least with Microsoft, we may get a Starcraft 3, new Tony Hawk or Warcraft.
At the end of the day, it's like this with me. Is there going to be a monopoly by Microsoft after acquiring Activision? No? OK, approve the deal. Everything else is whatever. A company that is buying another company to strengthen themselves is a legal transaction so if you want to continue to partake in their business, you need to get on a platform that has those games. That's all. No one here is owed anything so I don't particularly care if Microsoft takes their games and does whatever for it. It's theirs. That's the point of ownership. If the next Halo is literally on a toaster, I'll be buying the toaster. I'm not owed anything by Microsoft even though I've bought a Xbox during every generation. I don't carry a feeling of entitlement about my hobby.
For the most part seemingly though, most of the people here that wants the deal to go through is because there isn't anything about the deal that says that it shouldn't. By any metric used, even the FTC's, there is a 40% market share gap between Sony and Microsoft. The gap is larger than the share Microsoft has, according to the FTC. Praytell, what is the basis that an entity in that situation not be allowed to use all of their legal and financial means to improve their standing in said industry? There isn't one. The deal should be approved.
This guy gets it
iceberg187
Regular
This is why they buy instead of build. Putting together a team on top of this?
There is no correlation between the two points. MS has the funds to either secure exclusivity from an existing company, build studios and buy smaller talented studios instead of huge businesses.
Sony is proof of that because thats how they operate. Secondly, if MS needs to buy Zenimax and ABK to have big titles, then your admitting Sony should be phased out because they just dont have the funds to buy such huge companies.
Your correlation is unrelated.
Yes its what i've been saying for awhile now. Building new studios from the ground up wouldn't amount to much for a long time. Even buying a studio doesn't mean a new game will be out by them within this half of the decade.
iceberg187
Regular
Note what happened when the ideologue took over. Democratic and Republican administrations had both run this agency in that time frame. FTC increasingly doesn't matter in this situation.
certainly hard to pin point the exact dates on these surveys. What would have happened between 2020 and 2021. Biden didn't change the leadership of the ftc until june of 2021
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Deleted member 11852
Guest
It depends on the team and, to a degree, the ambition. Examples of teams who used to knock games out a a good pace are Bethesda (2006 Oblivion, 2008 Fallout 3, 2011 Skyrim, 2015 Fallout 4) and Naughty Dog (2007 Uncharted, 2009, Uncharted 2, 2011 Uncharted 3, 2013 The Last of Us) and both have gotten slow as molasses.
Then you look at Insomniac Games who has not slowed at all: 2006 Resistance Fall of Man, 2007 Ratchet & Clank Tools of Destruction, 2008 R&C Quest for Booty (DLC) and Resistance 2, 2009 Ratchet & Clank A Rift in Time, 2011 Resistance 3, 2013 R&C Into the Nexus, 2014 Sunset Overdrive, 2016 Ratchet & Clank, 2018 Spider-Man, 2020 Spider-Man Miles Morales, 2021 R&C A Rift Apart, 2023 Spider-man 2 (planned).
You absolutely can knock out high-scoring, highly polished games on a regular timetable. Whatever Insomniac's process is, I wish they would share it wider.
Is it Microsoft fault that Sony cannot buy ABK? If not so what exactly they are complaining about?
Thats the wrong question. The correct question is, should Sony buy ABK if they can? The answer is NO.
The second point that makes this question meaningless is the fact that the argument for MS buying ABK is actually due to MS's list of failures that @Metal_Spirit brought, which are presented falsely as Sony stealing or controlling the market.
Thats a whole different subject. That doesnt change the real question which is "should MS buy ABK".
Do you have a credible source with full details regarding this though?
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Deleted member 11852
Guest
How is that related to the above?
It’s not a hostile takeover. This isn’t MS just buying shares of ABK. ABK is actively pursuing the merger as per their social media accounts.
Not unlike Bethesda, not a hostile takeover for that either. Had MS not made the purchase, Sony would have locked up Starfield, Redfall alongside the deathloop and Tokyo ghost wire for timed exclusivity.
Would have straight up killed Xbox lol. No games for 2023.
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Deleted member 11852
Guest
Even before the Zenimax acquisition, how did Microsoft not have enough studios to release at least one game every year? What about Forza Horizon?
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