Microsoft acquired Activision Blizzard King for $69 Billion on 2023-10-13
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Sort of like you need Disney+ to watch Disney+ originals, HBO to watch HBO originals, Netflix to watch Nextflix originals, or a Playstation to play Playstation originals. Welcome to the world of entertainment consumption.I learn new things everyday. To potentially not be able to play ABK and Zenimax games under the sole discretion of Microsoft's platform wars, is good for me and millions of other players if we don't own XBOX or play on PC and own a Playstation instead.
Silent_Buddha
Legend
We don't know, the EU and UK haven't "officially" indicated their intentions. They are still presumably investigating and gathering testimony from any concerned parties either for or against the acquisition.
Although one member of the EU body that was formerly the head of a part of the governing body that was required to work closely with said commission said that people shouldn't worry and that the commission was hard at work to ensure that COD remained available on his PS5.
Regards,
SB
On one hand you guys claim exclusives shouldnt exist. Then you claim this is for the greatest good for the consumer. Then you say this sucks and thats how business is. Then you take it to console war "whataboutism", Sony revenge and console war fanboyism and MS should take games away because Sony hurt XBOX fan's feelings.
Pfft. Cognitive dissonance much.
Pfft. Cognitive dissonance much.
iceberg187
Regular
Who claims exclusives shouldn't exist? If Sony wants to keep everything in their walled garden, that's their right. If Microsoft wants to put games on various platforms of their choice, that's their right too. Again, these games aren't owed to anybody. Through Cloud Services and Gamepass, the utility of this purchase is ultimately a net positive for the consumer. You can play most of these games on anything that comes with a screen. Activision has a well-known aversion to these types of businesses. Under Microsoft, these games will be streamable in some capacity.
Lastly, it's not about revenge or fanboyism when people have stated correctly that Playstation only owners have been able to largely get everything that they want on one console for generations and now that this appears to no longer be the case and we give a collective 'so what, who cares' to those who are groveling. This isn't the first time it's happened in gaming and it possibly won't be the last. Things charge, circumstances change. Either you get a platform that supports the MS agenda and play the games or you don't. I got an N64 as a kid and I thought my gaming needs were going to be satisfied perfectly for the next 5-6 years. What could go wrong? Its the successor to the SNES! It's 64bits! Sega Saturn and some new Sony console is only 32 bits. Wrong choice because as a kid, I could only get one console. Game after game came out on PS1 that I would have loved to play on my N64 never came. It's just the nature of the beast. It seems like a great deal of people were definitely ok with Microsoft doing the Yosemite Sam routine of shooting themselves in the foot repeatedly and now that they have stopped, it's a problem.
At the end of the day, Microsoft wants games on PC, Xbox consoles, Televisions, Tablets & Phones. Most people living fall into one of those five categories, and it is a very accessible strategy for consumers to join the ecosystem. If you can't or won't find your space within those categories, that's on you, which is perfectly your choice to make. Just don't complain about it not being where you want it to be because again, no one is owed that.
As a PlayStation user you should learn this lesson long time ago. As we all did when we heard buy PlayStation if you want tot play ps exclusives. At least no one will take away from you ability to play on pc where majority of zenimax titles comes from anyway.I learn new things everyday. To potentially not be able to play ABK and Zenimax games under the sole discretion of Microsoft's platform wars, is good for me and millions of other players if we don't own XBOX or play on PC and own a Playstation instead.
I know capitalism sucks. When Sony make a deal to secure exclusivity we hear that this is not Sony fault but the company that agrees to to the deal. And we should blame square Konami or whoever. So maybe in this case we should blame zenimax that they were willing to sell.
Excusing MS acquiring Multiplatform games? A lesson as a playstation user? How your feelings were hurt when you bought a console that didnt live up to the expectations because Sony?
And you guys continue the excuses further solidifying that this is all about your personal feelings and has nothing to do with objective discussion about the market. I am just amazed by the lack of honesty even to yourselves that is revealed in the very posts that are supposed to argue this. It shows how pointless this discussion has been from the beginning.
And you guys continue the excuses further solidifying that this is all about your personal feelings and has nothing to do with objective discussion about the market. I am just amazed by the lack of honesty even to yourselves that is revealed in the very posts that are supposed to argue this. It shows how pointless this discussion has been from the beginning.
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You find excuses for sony as well so why it is not ok for me? I have diffrent view on the subject than you. I am not raging over games i am not able to play as a pc/xbox user.
Harder, tighter competition between sony, msft, nintendo is good for consumer as i said many times. And i agree with you the discussion is pointless i dont have all my favourites movies and series on netflix some of them are on disney or amazon prime. Thats how it is. Lack of honesty is making up stuff and producing false facts to fit narrative that both companies are trying to sell to us like "high performance consoles market" or "cod dosent matter" etc. I dont care about any of these. This has nothing to do with my personal feelings as i had none when it comes to this subject, i wouldnt care less if msft shut down zenimax tomorrow or if sony bankrupted tomorrow. We just have discussion how this all will affect game market and for some reason you interpret this as a personal matter.
Harder, tighter competition between sony, msft, nintendo is good for consumer as i said many times. And i agree with you the discussion is pointless i dont have all my favourites movies and series on netflix some of them are on disney or amazon prime. Thats how it is. Lack of honesty is making up stuff and producing false facts to fit narrative that both companies are trying to sell to us like "high performance consoles market" or "cod dosent matter" etc. I dont care about any of these. This has nothing to do with my personal feelings as i had none when it comes to this subject, i wouldnt care less if msft shut down zenimax tomorrow or if sony bankrupted tomorrow. We just have discussion how this all will affect game market and for some reason you interpret this as a personal matter.
Analyst: Xbox to Narrow PlayStation's Lead in 2023 (vgchartz.com)
"Karol Severin, the entertainment media and tech analyst at Midia Research, has released his predictions for 2023 via GamesIndustry.
Severin believes Xbox will "significantly narrow" the gap with PlayStation in 2023 due to Microsoft's hardware-agnostic efforts and its focus to provide value for money."
"The adverse macroeconomic climate couples well with Xbox's cross-platform and hardware-agnostic efforts, as well as with its focus to provide value for money and mitigate the requirement for consumers to part with large sums of money at once," said Severin.
"The combination of these dynamics mean Xbox is better positioned to thrive in a recessionary environment than PlayStation. As a result, Xbox will significantly narrow the gap in terms of console ownership and usage in 2023."
If this is the case and this analyse dosent include ABK in msft protfolio than personally i am against msft aquisition of ABK.
"Karol Severin, the entertainment media and tech analyst at Midia Research, has released his predictions for 2023 via GamesIndustry.
Severin believes Xbox will "significantly narrow" the gap with PlayStation in 2023 due to Microsoft's hardware-agnostic efforts and its focus to provide value for money."
"The adverse macroeconomic climate couples well with Xbox's cross-platform and hardware-agnostic efforts, as well as with its focus to provide value for money and mitigate the requirement for consumers to part with large sums of money at once," said Severin.
"The combination of these dynamics mean Xbox is better positioned to thrive in a recessionary environment than PlayStation. As a result, Xbox will significantly narrow the gap in terms of console ownership and usage in 2023."
If this is the case and this analyse dosent include ABK in msft protfolio than personally i am against msft aquisition of ABK.
He’s been very wrong so far. And my portfolio took a 15% beating in 2022. Can’t honestly see it getting even worse. I’m only seeing the world collectively recover from covid policies and the combat against hyper inflation has largely been completed.
It would worry me greatly if the world slid further. I’m expecting growth in 2023 which should slid into favour for ps5.
It would worry me greatly if the world slid further. I’m expecting growth in 2023 which should slid into favour for ps5.
‘My Heart Is Full’: Activision Blizzard Employees React To Microsoft Acquisition News (kotaku.com.au)
Activision (ATVI) Employees Are Optimistic About Microsoft Takeover (MSFT) - Bloomberg
I saw also more mentions to more recents articles but it was in youtube channel of "hoeg law" and i dont have a time to go thru videos to find it ( they are very long). But there were mentions about unions, positive change in culture and so on.
I see, to be honest this analyse was breath of fresh air in recent facts that we have been served. How the market looks and can look in the future. Even if not accurate and he is wrong i appreciate the effort of unbiased analyse. What we have been served so far seems like a modern astrology.
How does this not get moderated?
Among The panelists predictions (there are 4ish) he’s the only one who leans in this direction. Everyone else does not see a decline in spending or the industry.
Given how well PlayStation has done being more expensive across the board the last year and a bit, I can’t see Xbox gaining significant sales here because territorially, they have very poor distribution outside of the main 3 markets.
That leaves cloud and PC, and prior is not ready, the latter could grow but by how much is unknown.
Demand for PS5 is still very strong. Demand for Xbox I believe is currently largely driven by its value proposition at this moment.
A weak economy will just push players to stick with F2P titles now that both offer F2P online without subscription. Players on extreme budgets will borrow from libraries or do the BST bit. Xbox players will have the additional option to access gamepass.
We are being objective.
You are literally suffering from fear, uncertainty and doubt. The conversion is changing because the discussion frankly has run dry, and the same repeated arguments about harm and hurting customers keeps coming up.
ABKs properties, the most important ones, are all Multiplayer based, that means they are never leaving multiplatform because these types of games live and die by their population.
Overwatch isn't going anywhere
Call of Duty isn't going anywhere
You don't care about WoW, or Hearthstone, Diablo 4 will stay on Playstation, and they are lucky to release a title once a decade. The remaining Blizzard properties are all PC based. Sierra IPs have never really shown up.
Outside of Tony Hawk, Blur and Call of Duty, Activision has largely shut down all their other remaining IPs.
So objectively what is gained?
MS has agreed to move COD to the largest console market that Activision has not given a damn to cater to.
MS will likely resurrect a great deal of PC IPs because that is a particular space they are looking to grow, and those don't matter for PS users because these are M&K games.
The large multiplayer IPs will stay on playstation for the foreseeable future, a decade is an incredibly long time and with very high probability beyond.
So when we say you're just feeling things, it's because you are. On paper something was lost, sure, but in reality nothing has been lost or will be lost for a majority of playstation players.
Until the point that Sony's market share is small compared to the greater market, multiplayer games will not skip the dominant leader platform.
You keep saying you are being harmed by this, but I will promise you 10 years from now you will wonder why you bothered to even engage in this discussion, because you will be bored of COD in 10 years, and guess what, it's likely still going to be there if you're still playing on consoles beyond that.
And what about all the new properties that ABK will make under MS?
Well we're back to the original discussion of why 2nd party exclusives exist. These are titles that the original publishers were not confident enough in their ROI and platform holders stepped in to fund them in exchange for exclusivity. Meaning these companies, with platform support, will start making titles that no longer have huge ROI requirements attached to them. If these companies stayed 3rd party, they wouldn't have been built, because they would have built them - so there's technically no loss there either.
Is this directed at me? Because I sort of think you have taken other peoples views, plus my own, and created an imaginary amalgamation of the people arguing in favor of the acquisition and pointing out that our collective opinions have different points of origin. Be we are not all the same person. Also, I think we can all agree that we can have a philosophical belief in something, but also have a pragmatic point of view about the situation at hand. Like knowing that "lying is bad", but also telling your kid that the cat ran away instead of the truth; it got hit by a car. It's the same with "Exclusive shouldn't exist". You can believe that and want every game to exist on every platform, but also understand that it is part of the business and necessary for each platform to have a robust exclusive library to differentiate itself from it's competitors. Just like you could have the belief that corporate consolidation is bad, but also understand that Activision wanted to sell, and Microsoft was one of the few companies buying.
When I bring up things about the other entertainment industries, it isn't so much whataboutism in my view. At least not in the derogatory way you seam to be using it. I bring up things like Sony's investment into the Anime market, or Disney+/Netflix/HBO exclusive content to bring context to the arguments being made, not to detract from the issues at hand. In fact, I think looking at other entertainment industries, they show that exclusive content can be OK, even if it's annoying to have to buy in to different platforms to get the entertainment you want. For example...
Look at Disney+. It wouldn't exist as a viable competitor to HBO or Netflix if it wasn't for Disney's acquisitions of Lucas and Marvel. The fact that they purchased those companies has in fact made competition greater, because they are now a viable option in the streaming market. It does suck as a consumer to have to buy into a new streaming platform to consume that content, though. But if you think competition is good, and want less monopoly, then you need strong competitors or you end up with less competition. Which means a more fragmented market with different platforms offering different, exclusive content or experiences.
If it isn't clear, I'm not necessarily for consolidation in the games market, or any market for that matter, from a philosophical point of view. But I do understand that Activision wanted to sell. I also know that Microsoft wanted to buy. So with the pragmatic point of view that this is what both parties wanted, and looking at the market, and the public statements made about the most popular franchise of all time ever that is the only game that matters in the universe, I don't believe that this acquisition will prevent Sony from being competitive in the video game market. And given the context of how other entertainment industries have performed, even when important IPs have become exclusive to certain ecosystems, even if the important video game franchises become exclusive I don't foresee this being a death blow to the competition like it's being made out to be. Therefor, with the fact known that the acquisition is agreeable to the buyer and seller, the market conditions that exist, and the context of entertainment industries in general, I don't have an issue with it going forward.
Ok. If you say so.
D
Deleted member 11852
Guest
On the end of year DF weekly podcast, Richard Leadbetter was asked (I think by Ollie) about his recent XCloud streaming experience on his 1Gb internet service and it was not good.
I think this reaction is natural given it was shortly after the announcement (January 2022) and things were fraught at Activision's core studios. Now that employees have had a chance to consider what this really means, and had a chance to consider practicalities like changing pay, conditions and benefits, are they still happy?
On the end of year DF weekly podcast, Richard Leadbetter was asked (I think by Ollie) about his recent XCloud streaming experience on his 1Gb internet service and it was not good.
I think this reaction is natural given it was shortly after the announcement (January 2022) and things were fraught at Activision's core studios. Now that employees have had a chance to consider what this really means, and had a chance to consider practicalities like changing pay, conditions and benefits, are they still happy?
True I couldn’t find any more recent articles about that. A lot could changed since then.
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