Sony Game Studios Acquisitions [2022]

[mrcorbo]

I don't think Destiny is big enough of a ip or game to stop MS from restricting its own purchased ip. I also have a feeling when they say this stuff will be multiplatorm it will ultimately end up just being Sony platforms and steam like MS is just xbox and steam

Grain of salt and all that, but the public comments have been that Bungie will have control over what they make and what platforms they make it for. *If* the autonomy they will have (according to both parties in the deal) is genuine, then I don't see any advantage for Bungie to not put their games on as many platforms as they can manage. The stick on the studio side to encourage this is that if they don't like the way Sony is managing them their top talent can leave and start something new and, with all the money being thrown around, if it comes to that they will probably find plenty of funding to allow them to do so.

Edit: And to add on a second idea to this - I could fully see multiplatform continuing for MS and Sony owned multiplatform studios, but the "home court" advantage for the studio owner being that the game appears on their subscription service exclusively. So, "Buy it on PS, XBox, or PC or play it for free as part of your GamePass/PSNow sub".

 

[eastmen]

Grain of salt and all that, but the public comments have been that Bungie will have control over what they make and what platforms they make it for. *If* the autonomy they will have (according to both parties in the deal) is genuine, then I don't see any advantage for Bungie to not put their games on as many platforms as they can manage. The stick on the studio side to encourage this is that if they don't like the way Sony is managing them their top talent can leave and start something new and, with all the money being thrown around, if it comes to that they will probably find plenty of funding to allow them to do so.

Edit: And to add on a second idea to this - I could fully see multiplatform continuing for MS and Sony owned multiplatform studios, but the "home court" advantage for the studio owner being that the game appears on their subscription service exclusively. So, "Buy it on PS, XBox, or PC or play it for free as part of your GamePass/PSNow sub".

I dunno , I don't see a benefit outside of some additonal revenue for Bungie games to still show up on xbox and switch. I honestly think it will just be the old games getting supported and when destiny 3 comes out they wont support the other platforms outside of pc.

I also don't see bungie staff just up and going to make a new studio , they have successfully left other companies with thier company still in one piece. So I dunno. We just have to see how it all unfolds.

MS is facing the FTC with their activision purchase and I don't see anything getting held up there since it would only make MS the third biggest gaming company. With Sony purchasing Bungie it will only push them hire still than MS. But I wonder if the FTC steps in and stops Sony from Buying Bungie (not sure if bungie is american)

 

[PSman1700]

If this Bungie deal was so good, then why did MS omit a deal with them?

 

[BRiT]

If this Bungie deal was so good, then why did MS omit a deal with them?

Activision/Blizzard according to the rumors.

 

[mr magoo]

Its good for Sony for sure but as a consumer i dont feel very excited, if Destiny 2 and all dlcs (current and future )will not end up as free on ps+ than personally it means pretty much nothing to me. My situation hasn't changed at all, maybe is better for bungie to have extra financial support wich will ultimately result in better content but for now good for Sony i guess.

 

[AzBat]

Activision/Blizzard according to the rumors.

Which if is true, then that means there is a ceiling on acquisitions. Makes you wonder if this means we may not see any more until this one completes. Too bad the FTC got involved. It could take a year or more.

Tommy McClain

 

[eastmen]

Activision/Blizzard according to the rumors.

Maybe partially but the Activision deal was literally a few week long thing that happened. There is another deal on ms's side that they are working towards. We might hear about it next quarter if everything is agreed on. No where near as large as acitvision but I think its big enough to cause a stir. This is a company MS has been trying to get for a long time now.

Which if is true, then that means there is a ceiling on acquisitions. Makes you wonder if this means we may not see any more until this one completes. Too bad the FTC got involved. It could take a year or more.

Tommy McClain

Like I said in the sony thread. According to MS purchasing activision would make them third behind sony. But sony is now buying bungie. Which is a huge deal for MS but not in a bad way. Sony once again has created distance between the size of Microsofts gaming business and Sony's gaming business. This will help MS close the activision deal with the FTC and will allow them to purchase again without really changing the status quo of them being in third place (unless they bought ea or something ) So it could fit in with the company I'm hearing MS might purchase and they might be able to do it during the Activision review without much of an issue because its just a bit larger than the bungie deal from sony.

 

[PSman1700]

Activision/Blizzard according to the rumors.

They could have aquired both?

 

[mr magoo]

they "should"

 

[orangpelupa]

Its good for Sony for sure but as a consumer i dont feel very excited, if Destiny 2 and all dlcs (current and future )will not end up as free on ps+ than personally it means pretty much nothing to me. My situation hasn't changed at all, maybe is better for bungie to have extra financial support wich will ultimately result in better content but for now good for Sony i guess.

For bungie, they will have access to more studios to help them.

When they were still being helped by ~5 Activision studios, the DLCs contents are a bit too dry.

Since they moved to be independent, no more helper studios, their DLCs became dryer than the Sahara desert.

For Sony, they'll get a bunch of addicts that can be abused/exploited in any way. They'll also get the true insight of how to create addicts and making people willing to play the same stuff again and again and again.

So newer Sony games could have a better new game+ and/or level select modes, for example.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Guess making single player games is not sustainable anymore.

Clearly not true by the incredible success Sony has had with numerous single player games. They just want More money than Lots, and that requires branching out. But the single player is still strong with no apparent signs of weakening and requiring multiplayer to step in and make up the shortfalls of cash.

Edit: Did you meant to say "single platform"? Your comment was in response to a comment about multiplatform games, not multiplayer.

 

[PSman1700]

Seems only Nintendo will be in the minority if they stay single platform.

 

[iroboto]

Seems only Nintendo will be in the minority if they stay single platform.

I would be slightly worried as Nintendo as the chess board is changing rapidly and they are still holding the same path.

I believe the introduction of steam deck and cloud streaming opens a market up to invade Nintendo stronghold of mobile entertainment. The vectors will be available as soon as this year really, the only thing missing is the content.

there’s no doubt this is a consideration for both Sony and MS, they don’t need to take the risk of building handheld hardware, they just need to downport the software or enable it on cloud.

 

[zed]

FWIW the latest planet money episode has a podcast about the spiderman film rights thing
https://www.npr.org/sections/money/
doesnt mention the games though.

From the podcast, I dont like superhero films (except batman 1966, blade, hellboy) but I didnt think spiderman was the #1 superhero, I thought that was superman?, but also here they say https://www.comicbasics.com/ranked-the-100-greatest-superheroes-in-the-history-of-comic-books/ so perhaps its true.
Also interesting. https://www.game.co.uk/webapp/wcs/s...55755&catalogId=10201&langId=44&storeId=10151
captain america #1 in canada
though one thing I disagree with is in the podcast, surely sony (or anyone) cause just invent a bunch of superheros, half the guys in that top 100 list I have never heard of and a lot of their 'powers' are pretty lame. Quite a few of them were invented pretty recently as well.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Seems only Nintendo will be in the minority if they stay single platform.

And some of us have been really eager for them to open up. I'm not going to buy a whole new piece of hardware to play Ninty games, but I would like to play Ninty games. Currently though they do so well with high margin hardware that I'm not sure whether going multiplat would make them more money or not, if parents end up buying XB/PS to play Nintendo IP.

Also, they don't seem great at software development and might well struggle supporting multiple hardware configurations and fatter APIs. They've preferred to use similar (identical!) hardware between devices to keep everything the same. They have a few mobile excursions but are their major studios ready to create x86 versions of their games? Are they ready and able to use existing middlewares? They aren't even maintaining a cross-platform codebase for two Nintendo machines. It might take a hardware collapse for Nintendo to embrace a more modern, open-minded attitude.

 

[Jupiter]

I like first-person shooters a lot but next to Haze Destiny and Destiny 2 are by far the worst ones I've played since the first DOOM in the early 90s. I am surprised at the praise for the developers.

 

[Silenti]

...
MS is facing the FTC with their activision purchase and I don't see anything getting held up there since it would only make MS the third biggest gaming company. With Sony purchasing Bungie it will only push them hire still than MS. But I wonder if the FTC steps in and stops Sony from Buying Bungie (not sure if bungie is american)

Unless it turns political and someone wants to make a point. Word came down that the Justice Department will not be involved in this (potential conflict of interest at least), it is going to be the FTC. The new FTC head and the party she works for (Democrats) have made big tech and anti-trust a fairly visible part of their platform. Their demographic skews younger -> more likely to be involved in gaming. Normally I wouldn't think this kind of thing would move the needle but...

Hoeg law has put forth the idea that those arguing against the acquisition are going to try limit the scope to the new "subscription game service" concept rather than "gaming as a whole." That MS is trying to corner a fledgling market. I doubt that would stick, but it could cause a hangup/ become a bargaining position for conditions. The only individual loss here is a closed system (Sony) no longer receiving some of the games because they don't allow GamePass. I wouldn't think that argument alone would be enough to hold this up.

We don't even know which games that would be at this point. We are only guessing. The FTC could always make some divestiture conditions or just something like "COD has to remain multiplatform for X years". Considering MS would owe ABK $2-3B if the acquisition falls through, they are probably going to be amenable to some conditions rather than going to court.

 

[ChuckeRearmed]

I believe the introduction of steam deck and cloud streaming opens a market up to invade Nintendo stronghold of mobile entertainment. The vectors will be available as soon as this year really, the only thing missing is the content.

Will be interesting to follow handheld market Though Nintendo has always had a strong position there - GBA, 3DS, Switch

We don't even know which games that would be at this point. We are only guessing. The FTC could always make some divestiture conditions or just something like "COD has to remain multiplatform for X years". Considering MS would owe ABK $2-3B if the acquisition falls through, they are probably going to be amenable to some conditions rather than going to court.

Will be interesting to see the arguments of democrats in regards of console military shooter

 

[eastmen]

Unless it turns political and someone wants to make a point. Word came down that the Justice Department will not be involved in this (potential conflict of interest at least), it is going to be the FTC. The new FTC head and the party she works for (Democrats) have made big tech and anti-trust a fairly visible part of their platform. Their demographic skews younger -> more likely to be involved in gaming. Normally I wouldn't think this kind of thing would move the needle but...

Hoeg law has put forth the idea that those arguing against the acquisition are going to try limit the scope to the new "subscription game service" concept rather than "gaming as a whole." That MS is trying to corner a fledgling market. I doubt that would stick, but it could cause a hangup/ become a bargaining position for conditions. The only individual loss here is a closed system (Sony) no longer receiving some of the games because they don't allow GamePass. I wouldn't think that argument alone would be enough to hold this up.

We don't even know which games that would be at this point. We are only guessing. The FTC could always make some divestiture conditions or just something like "COD has to remain multiplatform for X years". Considering MS would owe ABK $2-3B if the acquisition falls through, they are probably going to be amenable to some conditions rather than going to court.

Okay so MS has 25m game pass subscribers. Netflix has 250 million netflix gaming subscribers since its included in the cost of netflix right now. It will just show how little ms actually has in terms of subscription market place.

At the end of the day the FTC wont actually care about COD because MS can just point to other large multiplatform shooters that are out there like the yearly Battlefield and then fortnite and apex. I seriously don't see this as more than a foot note to the FTC.

 

[Silenti]

Okay so MS has 25m game pass subscribers. Netflix has 250 million netflix gaming subscribers since its included in the cost of netflix right now. It will just show how little ms actually has in terms of subscription market place.

At the end of the day the FTC wont actually care about COD because MS can just point to other large multiplatform shooters that are out there like the yearly Battlefield and then fortnite and apex. I seriously don't see this as more than a foot note to the FTC.

Oh I don't disagree with you in general. Politics can throw a wrench in normal operations. There was a very public discussion last year about "Big Tech" and the companies that were facing scrutiny. Conspicuously absent from that list was Microsoft. A number of people publicly complained about that. Ultimately I agree with you, though I don't think the Netflix argument is a good one given their overall gaming presence. This wouldn't move the needle for me. But if politicians want to make hay.....

I realized this is the wrong thread to hold this discussion. This is the Sony acquisitions thread. So I shall stop here. No need to make more work for Shifty.