Microsoft acquired Activision Blizzard King for $69 Billion on 2023-10-13

[Deleted member 11852]

Not a misunderstanding, but likely just bias (strong). I had decided long before this document was released publicly that the reasons provided were bad from previous media releases. So when I read the document, it comes off as hyperbolic and over reaching (game pass should not be a separate market, I don’t see it much different from financing or leasing a vehicle).

I agree that the term 'foreclosed' feels weird, however that is word used in legislation. The usage here just means losing something. Sony are over-egging their pudding with the use of foreclose in relation to Call of Duty on PlayStation in terms of the possibility - likely eventuality - of Call of Duty being available on Game Pass. If Microsoft put Call of Duty into GamePass like they would any other IP they own, and still release it on PlayStation then you could (and Microsoft do) argue that Sony have not nothing. Sony obviously argue that it puts them at a competitive disadvantage.

I think the truth is somewhere in the middle because the majority of Xbox owners are not GamePass subscribers and only Microsoft know how many GamePass subscribers are also regular Call of Duty players. Something important to bear in mind, something like GamePass really only pays off if you play a variety of games. If you're the type of person who plays Call of Duty every day and very little else then subscribing to GamePass is more expensive over the course of a year than just buying it outright. And Phil Spencer has already set expectation that the GamePass subscription (and the cost of consoles) rising in the future.

This is me thinking about how dominant Sony is of course. Literally they fumbled the entire ps3 generation (over priced, late, hard to core for, arrogance) and Xbox held COD and Sony still managed to beat them, and 360 was probably xbox’s best years for content and innovation in the console space.

For me, this is an odd way of looking at it. As I've said before I think that the seventh generation of consoles shows that wen Sony put out an undesirable console it sells badly and when Microsoft out out a desirable console it sells well. PS3 sales were terrible for a few years because the console was expensive. 360 was a great console and sold great, but I suspect RRoD cost some sales and the awful profiteering on Wifi adaptors and bespoke external HDDs detracted from the value proposition of getting one of the cheaper models up front, then expanding it's capabilities down the line.

If you term the PS4 outselling XBO by 2:1 as dominating, what is the term for Microsoft Windows's usage compared to any other desktop OS, which is slower to 10:1? Out of four platforms, cross-platform software sales on PlayStation rarely represent more than 30% of total sales which is far from market domination. Should Microsoft be penalised for the massive number of machines running Windows? How is that fair to linux OS makers? But more people chose to Windows, right? And more people chose to buy PlayStations.

Against the background of political and economics shift that big tech companies need to be broken up (rather than made larger), I think that these massive types of acquisitions in the future are probably going to end up with a presumably of denial.

 

[iroboto]

I agree that the term 'foreclosed' feels weird, however that is word used in legislation. The usage here just means losing something.

I mean, I guess it depends on where you wiki, I went with this defintion from European Commission: "Foreclosure is defined as denying actual or potential competitors profitable access to a market". edit: though I should not just naively apply this particular term every time I see it as you state.
I just didn't think that this particular statement is true. They have significant profitable access to the market as profitable access to the market is not gained by having COD on your platform, and MS has not declared that it would deny Sony access either, and owning the marketing rights to the IP should also not be considered denial.

Though, if you're just using foreclosure like the possession, or loss of something, then I could see why I look like I'm misunderstanding.

For me, this is an odd way of looking at it. As I've said before I think that the seventh generation of consoles shows that wen Sony put out an undesirable console it sells badly and when Microsoft out out a desirable console it sells well.

I think here when I was writing this: that in Sony's worst possible setup for PS3, and MS best possible console setup with Xbox combined with the ownership of COD exclusive benefits and market rights (when COD was HOT, and not just the remakes we have today) was unable to cause any market foreclosure. In fact, numerically, Sony still beat them at the end, and MS had a very successful kinect launch as well!
Then I don't believe it makes any sense to say that ownership of COD will cause market foreclosure, and it verifies in my mind that CoD is just not that important as people think it is, and today's F2P market, it's less important than ever. If CoD was so dominant, it wouldn't have needed to have gone F2P with Warzone for instance. Steam has gone some time without COD on its store. No effect.

If you term the PS4 outselling XBO by 2:1 as dominating, what is the term for Microsoft Windows's usage compared to any other desktop OS, which is slower to 10:1?

Windows, Google Search, Ad Words, IOS, etc are all monopolies. Let's be real, there's no competitor in those particular areas. Bing is the closest competitor to Google search and is less than 1% of all total search or something of that sort. I wouldn't call those dominating. The silver lining is that today Sony and Xbox still compete. But as of late, I just don't see much innovation coming from Sony. I'd like to see more, more as in, what they accomplished to moving the needle for consumers during the PS3 era. At the heart of it, MS is the one being forced to innovate, and Sony has been following suit after the fact. This might be an ideal setup for gamers, I dunno. But had MS exited the business with the XBO generation, and they were close, and Sony definitely tried to help nudge that along, there would only be Sony left, and they haven't convinced me since becoming the dominant market leader that they would do anything like what MS has been doing with gamepass, cloud, and cross play pushing. So, to that end, if either company falls out of competition, it would be bad.

Technically, anyone looking in at this could say, well, there's good competition happening here, so let's just leave it as is. And in some ways they could be totally correct, since MS has money to deal with that type of loss. But I assure you, if game pass folds, and xcloud folds, MS will likely exit as they have with Mixer. There are no future profits there worth fighting for imo, the market is just too small for them to care.

 

[chris1515]

I mean, I guess it depends on where you wiki, I went with this defintion from European Commission: "Foreclosure is defined as denying actual or potential competitors profitable access to a market".
I just didn't think that this particular statement is true. They have significant profitable access to the market as profitable access to the market is not gained by having COD on your platform, and MS has not declared that it would deny Sony access either, and owning the marketing rights to the IP should also not be considered denial.

Though, if you're just using foreclosure like the possession, or loss of something, then I could see why I look like I'm misunderstanding.

I think here when I was writing this: that in Sony's worst possible setup for PS3, and MS best possible console setup with Xbox combined with the ownership of COD exclusive benefits and market rights (when COD was HOT, and not just the remakes we have today) was unable to cause any market foreclosure. In fact, numerically, Sony still beat them at the end, and MS had a very successful kinect launch as well!
Then I don't believe it makes any sense to say that ownership of COD will cause market foreclosure, and it verifies in my mind that CoD is just not that important as people think it is, and today's F2P market, it's less important than ever. If CoD was so dominant, it wouldn't have needed to have gone F2P with Warzone for instance. Steam has gone some time without COD on its store. No effect.

Windows, Google Search, Ad Words, IOS, etc are all monopolies. Let's be real, there's no competitor in those particular areas. Bing is the closest competitor to Google search and is less than 1% of all total search or something of that sort. I wouldn't call those dominating. The silver lining is that today Sony and Xbox still compete. But as of late, I just don't see much innovation coming from Sony. I'd like to see more, more as in, what they accomplished to moving the needle for consumers during the PS3 era. At the heart of it, MS is the one being forced to innovate, and Sony has been following suit after the fact. This might be an ideal setup for gamers, I dunno. But had MS exited the business with the XBO generation, and they were close, and Sony definitely tried to help nudge that along, there would only be Sony left, and they haven't convinced me since becoming the dominant market leader that they would do anything like what MS has been doing with gamepass, cloud, and cross play pushing. So, to that end, if either company falls out of competition, it would be bad.

Technically, anyone looking in at this could say, well, there's good competition happening here, so let's just leave it as is. And in some ways they could be totally correct, since MS has money to deal with that type of loss. But I assure you, if game pass folds, and xcloud folds, MS will likely exit as they have with Mixer. There are no future profits there worth fighting for imo, the market is just too small for them to care.

They have now more studios than Sony and they have big franchise(Fallout, Elder scroll, Starfield, Halo, Gears of War, Forza, Forza Horizon, Doom, Wolfenstein, Dishonored, Hellblade, Perfect Dark, Sea of Thieves, Everwild, State of Decay. Evil Within, Ghostwire Tokyo, Deathloop and new IP...). This is not the fault of Sony if they aren't competent enough to release games at a good rhythm or have a long term strategy. Sony don't do like MS because of the game they are producing make less sense than live service games into PS plus extra days one and they have less money too. If they can't beat Sony with Gamepass, more studios, more money without Activision Blizzard then all the executive, studio head and producer of Xbox division disserved to be fired.

And if Microsoft exit the market I am sure Amazon, Netflix or Google will take the spot with pleasure. We have probably only one generation of consoles after the current one and the market will be mature for cloud gaming. This is a long term play for Microsot without Activision Blizzard. With Activision Blizzard, Sony will fall pretty fast.

 

[iroboto]

And if Microsoft exit the market I am sure Amazon, Netflix or Google will take the spot with pleasure

I think if MS is done. There won't be another competitor, things may just stay as Nintendo, PS, and PC. There's just no way to penetrate that market, the upfront costs to break into the console industry is staggering and the net return doesn't make financial sense if you're just playing for the generation. With console hardware moving at an even slower pace, I cant' see anyone wanting to step up.

Cloud gaming is not there yet, and whether there is a merger or not, FPS games typically do very poorly on streaming.
10 years is a long time for things to change hands. CoD is not the innovator of gameplay mechanics, they were behind on open wide combat. They were behind on battle royale. If the next big thing comes, CoD may not be the one to claim the throne for it. It could be a space sim, or something else that is massively multiplayer. Oddly, something like star citizen. The markets are changing, we grew up with these style of games, and we have a lot of disposable income. This is the first time we have hardcore gamers 40-50 years of age. But the new generation is growing up with sandbox titles, like Minecraft, Roblox, Minecraft, BR titles, f2p like Genshin Impact, Fortnite, etc. We could see a very large change in the types of games played 10 years from now once that age group hits the labour force. Unreal 5 may have a very large say in how our newer titles are crafted.

At the very least, I hope the world would have moved on from arena military shooters 10 years from now.

 

[chris1515]

I think if MS is done. There won't be another competitor, things may just stay as Nintendo, PS, and PC. There's just no way to penetrate that market, the upfront costs to break into the console industry is staggering and the net return doesn't make financial sense if you're just playing for the generation. With console hardware moving at an even slower pace, I cant' see anyone wanting to step up.

Cloud gaming is not there yet, and whether there is a merger or not, FPS games typically do very poorly on streaming.
10 years is a long time for things to change hands. CoD is not the innovator of gameplay mechanics, they were behind on open wide combat. They were behind on battle royale. If the next big thing comes, CoD may not be the one to claim the throne for it. It could be a space sim, or something else that is massively multiplayer. Oddly, something like star citizen. The markets are changing, we grew up with these style of games, and we have a lot of disposable income. This is the first time we have hardcore gamers 40-50 years of age. But the new generation is growing up with sandbox titles, like Minecraft, Roblox, Minecraft, BR titles, etc. We could see a very large change in the types of games played 10 years from now once that age group hits the labour force.

Minecraft is a Microsoft property. And this is not like COD Warzone is not a thing.

 

[iroboto]

Minecraft is a Microsoft property. And this is not like COD Warzone is not a thing.

I don't mean from an ownership perspective, but just a 'these are the games I played as a child having an affect on our game selection moving forward'. I'm not expecting it to be played forever, but what we play as children have strong connections to what we enjoy playing as adults.

 

[chris1515]

what difference does it make. I'm not expecting it to be played forever, but what we play as children have strong connections to what we enjoy playing as adults.

Again the market won't change in a decade. COD is very important for the foreseeable future probably the next 15/20 years.

 

[eastmen]

That's true, but MS as a whole is the far bigger business which potentially enables them to 'buy in' to competing spaces. eg. They are presently not big in the face paint market versus. It could be argued they could buy Blue Squid and Artiparty and still be smaller than Snazaroo. however, they would have jumped right up to 'competitive' and then be able to leverage their larger presence across all business to then outcompete Snazaroo.


I think this is because the US offered a completely different market. Being the biggest home market with a single language, companies could sell to the home market and make more money than elsewhere. Two companies offering the same experience in a nascent market in the US and UK, the US company would make about 5x more money from the 5x larger population (give or take, lots of details to consider). They can then offer to buy the UK company, or outcompete for another 20% from the English-speaking UK. I think that's largely how it's gone with a lot of businesses and basically gives the US an immediate massive advantage in international business in offering the largest home market. Certainly in computing, the 80s were discrete markets with discrete products, but IBM and MS had such large home market incomes they could ascend other companies (Europe) dealing with 7+ languages to tap the same sort of economics, which was just impossible for small startups.

So basically, America has an advantage which cannot be competed with fairly due to politics and history. It's like a kid who's born massive dominating the football/rugby field - there's nothing the other kids can do but bounce off. So then either people sit back and find where they can compete in niches where it's not just a size-thing, or they introduce rules limiting what the big kid can do to give other kids a chances.

Well 1) we already know sony is using their business power from other markets to buy up studios and buy exclusive content. The market leader should always have the least access to this. Sony is the one keeping other competitors out of the market not MS
2) a lof of the EU speaks english. It is the worlds most popular language still. I mean the UK used to have some of the largest companies in the world but then imploded on themselves . It's kinda the reason why the united states even exists now.

 

[iroboto]

Again the market won't change in a decade. COD is very important for the foreseeable future probably the next 15/20 years.

I disagree with that. PUBG and battlefield has had their chances to take them out, in some ways Halo was expected to. PUBG was ground breaking and dominant, because they could not curtail performance issues and the amount of Jank and general lack of polish they couldn’t dominate the BR market. COD was 2nd last to the BR scene. The next big game may not even be shooter based. Lots of things can change in 10 years. BR changed the FPS scene under a generation.

I’ve played FPS nearly my whole gaming career and did so competitively at a national level with counter strike. If the genre changes some studios are slower to pick up on it. Rainbow 6 siege is also a notable addition, that was on crazy ascent then it fell luke warm due to BR.

As far as I can see TPS shooter games (Fortnite and others), and 2 types of FPS genres were added that shook the shooter category up all in 1 generation.

 

[eastmen]

Again the market won't change in a decade. COD is very important for the foreseeable future probably the next 15/20 years.

Trends can easily die off quickly. 20 years ago there was no fortnite and now fortnite is one of the biggest shooters out there. I believe it came out in 2017. There is no reason to believe that more shooters wont come out that disrupt COD's postion in the market. It doesn't have to just be 1 title. It can be multiple titles coming out and drawing away the fan base. It could even be a combination of a bad cod release and good releases of other games.

 

[iroboto]

Trends can easily die off quickly. 20 years ago there was no fortnite and now fortnite is one of the biggest shooters out there. I believe it came out in 2017. There is no reason to believe that more shooters wont come out that disrupt COD's postion in the market. It doesn't have to just be 1 title. It can be multiple titles coming out and drawing away the fan base. It could even be a combination of a bad cod release and good releases of other games.

15 years ago iPhone 1 was invented and Call of duty 4 just took the fps world by storm dethroning halo. I think the COD franchise is only now 20 years old as we roll to 2023. And cod MW1 remake was just last year with the second remake this year.

It’s crazy how old we are, I recall the point in which everyone was still on blackberry devices and waving off the iPhone for its lack of a tactile keyboard.

 

[chris1515]

If Call of Duty is on verge to disappear with COD mobile too. They can take a concession to buy Activision Blizzard without COD maybe this is possible the deal will be validated if they decide to take everything out of COD.

 

[Nisaaru]

I think the truth is somewhere in the middle because the majority of Xbox owners are not GamePass subscribers and only Microsoft know how many GamePass subscribers are also regular Call of Duty players. Something important to bear in mind, something like GamePass really only pays off if you play a variety of games. If you're the type of person who plays Call of Duty every day and very little else then subscribing to GamePass is more expensive over the course of a year than just buying it outright. And Phil Spencer has already set expectation that the GamePass subscription (and the cost of consoles) rising in the future.

The reality of Gamepass is that people can convert their Xbox Live ABOs 1:1 to Gamepass and all MS games are freely available on it. Meaning Halos, FS, Forza/Horizon, Doom,...every MS/Bethesda game and most likely soon all the Activision stuff. There is simply no reason not to get it at this moment. If you're smart you get 3 years of Xbox live and convert them.

So your "only pays off if you play a variety" is just *wrong*.

 

[mr magoo]

Sony is burning every bridge it can to counter Microsoft's Activision deal

Sony and Microsoft are tearing themselves apart over the biggest games acquisition ever

www.gamesradar.com

 

[mr magoo]

Trends can easily die off quickly. 20 years ago there was no fortnite and now fortnite is one of the biggest shooters out there. I believe it came out in 2017. There is no reason to believe that more shooters wont come out that disrupt COD's postion in the market. It doesn't have to just be 1 title. It can be multiple titles coming out and drawing away the fan base. It could even be a combination of a bad cod release and good releases of other games.

Sony owns bungie creators of the two of the biggest franchises in fps. Halo and destiny. Sony is not without options here.

 

[iroboto]

If Call of Duty is on verge to disappear with COD mobile too. They can take a concession to buy Activision Blizzard without COD maybe this is possible the deal will be validated if they decide to take everything out of COD.

I don't think you're wrong in saying they have huge impact on the market. They certainly do, and today they are the leaders. There's no guarantee that they will stay that way is all I'm saying. 10-20 years is a really long time for things to change. But I think you'd be right that they'll likely still be the market leader for the next 4-5 years.

This is technically a new generation with some new SSD tech that should change the way we approach level design etc. Also with things like dynamic LOD coming into play, it just means developers are less limited before. Smaller studios have significantly more powerful toolset without the high costs of running an expensive studio (UE5), so I think this coming generation will be interesting once we leave cross gen behind. Each generation is a new opportunity to have new innovations in gameplay, design and graphics, like a new formula 1 season =P.

I may have given away my XSX and PS5 too early, as I returned to PC, but maybe I should have waited an extra year or 2 to see the fruition of this generation before leaving consoles again.

As per your comment, MS wants the developers too. The CoD studios run a tight ship and rarely ever delay while pushing the graphics etc forward.

 

[PSman1700]

I may have given away my XSX and PS5 too early, as I returned to PC, but maybe I should have waited an extra year or 2 to see the fruition of this generation before leaving consoles again.

If your on PC, XSX or PS5, you'l be able to experience 'next generation' gaming.

 

[iroboto]

If your on PC, XSX or PS5, you'l be able to experience 'next generation' gaming.

Yea I know. Lol. Just didn’t want to hassle of guessing why things are performing poorly, compilation stutter, maybe in the future SSD stutter!
nice things consoles have over PC, they should not release a variant that plays poorly.

 

[PSman1700]

Yea I know. Lol. Just didn’t want to hassle of guessing why things are performing poorly, compilation stutter, maybe in the future SSD stutter!
nice things consoles have over PC, they should not release a variant that plays poorly.

Yes thats true, however i believe that for the large titles and sony ports things will be aight, if not at launch then with a patch. Its the disadvantages for the PC, however theres advantages to it aswell. If you have a competent pc that atleast matches the consoles in capabilities its just to give it a go and see what happens i guess.
XSX and PS5 is quite a nice combination, though the PC is almost if not fully offering the same in games (both sony and MS games + PC games/indie games and mods or enhancements).

 

[eastmen]

I don't think you're wrong in saying they have huge impact on the market. They certainly do, and today they are the leaders. There's no guarantee that they will stay that way is all I'm saying. 10-20 years is a really long time for things to change. But I think you'd be right that they'll likely still be the market leader for the next 4-5 years.

This is technically a new generation with some new SSD tech that should change the way we approach level design etc. Also with things like dynamic LOD coming into play, it just means developers are less limited before. Smaller studios have significantly more powerful toolset without the high costs of running an expensive studio (UE5), so I think this coming generation will be interesting once we leave cross gen behind. Each generation is a new opportunity to have new innovations in gameplay, design and graphics, like a new formula 1 season =P.

I may have given away my XSX and PS5 too early, as I returned to PC, but maybe I should have waited an extra year or 2 to see the fruition of this generation before leaving consoles again.

As per your comment, MS wants the developers too. The CoD studios run a tight ship and rarely ever delay while pushing the graphics etc forward.

COD is important for sure but I think a lot of people don't realize how well some of Activisions other titles will mesh with game pass and xbox itself.

Wow for instance still have millions of players and I am sure will sell very well for them if its put on the xbox series s. The S is surely able to run it extremely well (its about 20 years old and while its had graphical updates they didn't really move the needle much in terms of hardware requirements) Diablo 4 will be another big offering . There are also some other games that I am sure MS would put out on xbox / steam to bring in more players to their ecco system.

MS offered a 10 year contract to sony. If we assume it starts after this current contract that is about 12 years of COD on playstation still to come. It will firmly put it on playstation until mid next gen (assuming a 2028 ps6 release) . So I don't see that really affecting the outcome of a gamer buying a xbox over a playstation.

Anyway guess we have to wait till june to see what happens at this point