Torrent of Pork
Banned
Alright, I'll bite.
Who's going to oust him? The other shareholders who didn't do so with every other scandal?
Microsoft / Activision Deal Approval Watch |OT| (MS/ABK close)
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Who's going to oust him? The other shareholders who didn't do so with every other scandal?
SenjutsuSage
Banned
Sony was one of the companies that co-developed compact disc. No other company was better equipped than Sony to launch a game console using CDs at the time. Let's not act like we don't know who Sony was back in the 90s. There's no denying that Sony's existing business and financial firepower were key to establishing Playstation and cutting the kinds of deals necessary to allow them to dominate. One part of that was taking out a huge financial stake in square at a time when the company was most in trouble after a heavily sony inspired and involved movie "Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within" bombed (a movie in which Sony was distributor, a production partner, as well the company that released the soundtrack) and just as a new competitor was entering the space isn't insignificant. This is but one example (though a pretty major one) of Sony's financial muscle as well as its business eco-system being used to its advantage to cut financial deals and also wield influence enormous gaming influence.
I don't have a problem with how Sony does business, but we should not pretend it is somehow nobler than the way Microsoft does business. Microsoft, as Sony has done before them, and as Sony continues to do even now, utilize the strengths of their parent companies, including the raw influencing power of cash money to buy, acquire and cut whatever exclusive deal is necessary to grow their respective gaming operations. Microsoft is just capable of spending a far larger sum of money than Sony. It doesn't make Microsoft's methods any more or less impure or sinister.
gothmog
Gold Member
Did any of these supposedly other scandals personally cost the shareholders money?
Yoboman
Member
Maybe it would be believable if they weren't the only example of taking a publisher exclusive, and they weren't changing their story every month. Whereas Sony said multiplat from the second they announced the acquisition
SenjutsuSage
Banned
All regulators, no matter what they say, are focused on Call of Duty, which is why the deal is almost certainly going to be approved. All the other distractions about cloud gaming or multi-game subscriptions is just that, a distraction. Everything from the very beginning has always rested on Call of Duty.
Meaning the passing of the deal will rest on proving Call of Duty isn't as super special as Sony claims, and that Microsoft can be taken at its word about not removing Call of Duty from Playstation, which I really don't believe they ever will. It could work out for them, sure, but it doesn't make any sense at all. It is most valuable to Microsoft, Xbox and to Game Pass by continuing to kill sales wise on Playstation. And where people choose to move to Xbox and invest in Game Pass, that's just how it will be. But there will plenty enough people who are comfortable with sticking it out on Playstation for their Call of Duty fix.
James Sawyer Ford
Member
He had a lot of pressure from other shareholders.
He could certainly try and press his luck by remaining CEO but I’m sure other shareholders or even the employees themselves may force his hand
James Sawyer Ford
Member
Uhh, Call of Duty is exactly what I would call super special
Typically the number one gaming property year in and year out by a pretty significant margin
Warablo
Member
Well Sony is saying they will cease to exist if CoD goes exclusive. That they can't compete, which is ridiculous.
James Sawyer Ford
Member
Are they though? I haven’t heard this claim
I think they are claiming that if the deal goes through it removes competition and choice from the gamers, which is a really likely outcome
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IFireflyl
Gold Member
Tell me you know nothing about mergers and acquisitions without telling me you know nothing about mergers and acquisitions.
gothmog
Gold Member
Sony actually said that losing CoD would cause them harm. Which it would. Sony can easily show a year after year bump in revenue during the timeframe when CoD is released. Even in the "bad" years. Even Microsoft has agreed that it will cause harm, but they disagree about how much long term harm it would cause. Even if they made it exclusive which they are not immediately.
If Sony let this go without making any kind of fight or challenge then their leadership would be out on their asses immediately. Defending your company from a global giant that has a history of throwing its weight around to get what it wants is not whining.
gothmog
Gold Member
Lol. There's even a video that has been shared in here a few times interviewing the FTC chair where she explains without going into details what their concerns are about what tech giants like Meta and Microsoft are doing. I do not remember if they mentioned CoD but I'm pretty sure they did not.
CatLady
Selfishly plays on Xbox Purr-ies X
At this point we have enough evidence to not trust what Jim or Phil says or at least be skeptical lol they've both been caught in some whoppers but it's a good point that Minecraft stayed multiplatform but the next ES/Skyrim/Fallout will be exclusive those are huge traditional multiplatform franchises so there's examples in support of both sides of the argument. The deal will most likely go through so these arguments will probably be mute anyway but going forward I would like game journalists to have some intellectual curiosity about these big purchases because I think consolidation will be the downfall of the industry I don't want to see MS and Sony buying up 3rd party publishers that's just a road to nowhere....could you imagine Nintendo buying up publishers and locking away franchises on that low powered hardware
Of course, they 'll be exclusive, they are single-player Xbox first party games. He NEVER promised to keep making new games for PlayStation. Obsidian, Ninja Theory and Compulsion are also Xbox first party but that doesn't stop Sony from whining about those being exclusive either. Even so Phil has left all the preexisting Bethesda games on PS and has even given them game updates, the Doom remake, Skyrim anniversary and let them keep a bunch of Bethesda games on PS+.
Phil said he would keep Minecraft on all platforms, and he has, he said he'd sign a 10-year contract to keep CoD on PS5, he probably won't now since that is apparently also inadequate for Ryan, but he never said anything about putting all of Xbox first party games on PS5. Is ryan and Sony going to put all their first party on Xbox? If not, they have now reason to demand Xbox to do it for them.
James Sawyer Ford
Member
This is a false equivalence.
The issue is whether Activision is big enough to be considered anti trust as Microsoft is acquiring them for an amount that is close to the market cap of Sony in its entirety.
GHG
Gold Member
You keep saying this. What exactly is a "normal consumer"? Playstation customers are not considered "normal"?
So the tens of millions of people who happen to only own playstation platforms are not considered "normal" in your eyes?
In summary:
- Xbox customers - "normal"
- Everyone else - "fuck em, make them come to xbox"
Laughable stance but not all that surprising.
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CatLady
Selfishly plays on Xbox Purr-ies X
I think if it doesn't go through, Microsoft will have about $65B freed up to pay Activision whatever they want for and extended marketing contract. And if it doesn't go through, I'm also guessing they would much rather partner with Xbox than Sony.
CatLady
Selfishly plays on Xbox Purr-ies X
No, what you're saying is a false equivalence and has nothing to do with what I posted.
Warablo
Member
That's why I said I understand them trying to fight it, but some of arguments are so hollow and misleading. Sony is trying to correlate all their profits are because CoD. So a person buys CoD and God of War. Thank you CoD.
Normal customers are those without a religious devotion to one plastic box over another.
If the games they want come out on a box they don’t have, they would get the box they don’t have.
Playstation customers are normal. People who would rather give up playing their favorite games than buy an xbox are not.
James Sawyer Ford
Member
Just because Microsoft buying Activision presents a clear anti trust issue, since they are the biggest third party publisher and own multiple enormous IPs that dwarf anything in Sony’s lineup, does not mean that Sony and MS can’t continue to have exclusives of their own.
The issue is whether the acquisition is large enough in scale to cause a massive imbalance in competitiveness
GHG
Gold Member
Interesting. In that case not sure why I see so many complaints about exclusive games then, particularly from him and other people overwhelmingly in favour of this deal.
Maybe one day they too can join the ranks of the "normal consumers" and stop complaining then.
CatLady
Selfishly plays on Xbox Purr-ies X
Yeah, that's wonderful and all but it is a non sequitur to what I was discussing with someone else.
DJ12
Member
Have you seen the offer? Or just heard about it from a MS shilling website?
You dont know what caviates are in the deal should it really exist or anything it could contain that would be more unpalitable than the 'several year' (3) contract that they offered in the first place.
To be honest though, I really dont care about CoD. Sony would be doing everyone a favour just to allow gamepass on playstation as long as it was native apps not streaming, this would ultimately benefit Sony consumers as for little more than the price of one yearly CoD game they'd have access to all MSs shit.
There's fights worth having and i dont think this is one. Sony would get a percentage of every sub, MS would litteraly be required to make ps versions as good as possible as the vast majority of their customers would be on Playstation anyway.
Its a win win in my opinion.
Having said that, for forum lols the deal must get blocked.
There is already a massive imbalance in competitiveness. All this would do is change around who is ahead and who is behind.
If the gaming industry is ok to continue as it is with Sony on top, it should be allowed to continue as it is with Microsoft on top instead.
So we should have expected MS to release Killer Instinct, Banjo Nuts and Bolts, etc on Nintendo too. Then we should have gave them a lot of shit for Dead Rising 3. Who complained about harm to consumers on Dead Rising 3? Show of hands. You adamsapple?
Who even complained about FF7R harm to consumers when it was announced?
This whataboutism is only being brought up now because you don't understand the theory of harm by buying big publishers and all you can come up with is a timed deal for 1 or 2 franchises as justification.
MasterCornholio
Member
Sony isn't that far ahead to be honest. Its pretty competitive at the moment.
Banjo64
cumsessed
You had a prime opportunity to prove this (alongside some sense of neutrality) when MS tried to double the price of Gold, but you defended their attempt instead. That’s why no one cares if you own a PS/Nintendo system.
Playstation has outsold xbox every generation that they’ve both existed, the last gen ended 2:1 in favour of playstation and without any big moves from MS it would be the same or worse for them again this time.
Banjo64
cumsessed
Oh shit, isn’t that interesting.Yes, according to a document sent to the CMA but they said no. I don't see a lot of anger from the green rats and journalists about this. But Sony has to bow down and allow GP or they are the devil.
So much hypocrisy. Phil will get his award
They have.
"Bungie has future games in development, will they now become PlayStation exclusives?
No. We want the worlds we are creating to extend to anywhere people play games. We will continue to be self-published, creatively independent, and we will continue to drive one, unified Bungie community."
James Sawyer Ford
Member
What massive imbalance?
Right now things are more equitable. Companies can compete on their own merits without needing massive subsidies from other profitable divisions.
Microsoft buying Activision and subsidizing their GamePass titles presents a much clearer market distortion that can only be enabled by a BigTech company and not on the gaming industry alone.
This massive shift in exogenous resources could lead to competition issues not only from Sony, but also Nintendo and all other major publishers that weakens the healthy ecosystem of the games industry.
Kagey K
Banned
We don't remember just a few years ago and Crash remastered coming out. All of the is it or isn't it exclusive bullshit?
This stops that.
Everyone says they are getting games they would already be getting, but this insures they get them day one instead of day 365 or 784 or whatever else.
It will be interesting to see if Sony backs off a bot from these deals or goes all in after the results of this.
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Banjo64
cumsessed
Watch someone else’s opinion to form your own opinion
Just read the source documentation if you want to form your own opinion.
MasterCornholio
Member
Outselling them isn't the issue. There's always going to be a market leader. What's worrying is if Sony is massively ahead which they are not. As for what happened last gen that was due to Microsoft making some pretty bad mistakes with the X1. Sony also made some pretty bad mistakes with the PS3 as well. They rebounded with the PS4 and Microsoft is doing much better now with the Series consoles. That's the nature of a competitive market.
When someone messes up they lose market share. When they do well they perform much better. Which Microsoft is BTW as they have the numbers to prove it.
Banjo64
cumsessed
You can own all consoles, as I do too, and still be harmed by this. I only play From games on PlayStation because I platinum them all. If MS were to acquire From I still wouldn’t want to play the games through Game Pass and if they were removed from PS that would be restricting my options as a consumer. Not arguing with you just flagging that.
Kagey K
Banned
Ppl here can't even read a 3 sentence OP, there's no way they are parsing 300+ pages of legal text.Watch someone else’s opinion to form your own opinion
Just read the source documentation if you want to form your own opinion.
That's okay. If they pay enough money to secure COD into PS+ Extra/Premium, Microsoft should offer them the chance.
But of course, Sony is stingy and they would argue that if Microsoft can get COD into Game Pass "for free," they should be able to do the same too...
Which is horseshit.
That's complete bullshit. The key to Playstations success wasn't financial firepower or any deals. Sony were a games publisher on Nintendo. With Nintendo they wanted to make a SNES CD to reduce cost for all publishers. Nintendo pulled out of the partnership. Sony believed in the idea so much that they created the PlayStation. They didn't need to make any deals with other publishers because the third party publishers didn't want to pay the ridiculous cartridge costs and naturally gravitated to the PS. You bring up Square's movie but fail to realise that was 1 yr after the PS2 launch i.e. Square were already making PS games before and Sony were already successful. Square was in financial trouble during the PS2 and Sony bought a non-controlling stake to help them out of that hole so that they can continue creating hit games but kept them independent even siting the fact that they don't plan to prevent Square from contributing games to competitive system makers. Square is independent to this day. They sold that stake at PS4 launch.
This is the daftest example though. If that stake had any "gaming influence" it would have prevented FF hitting 360 and xbox for the first time. Since PS3 gen was actually when they owned that square stake and the FF games released. Hell Square were making 360 exclusives like Star Ocean 4 and Infinite Undiscovery because of MS deals. Sony's stake in companies is investment to continue to create games without dictating where they make games. They rely on these companies. If the independent third party company chooses to or not that's a different matter.
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Kagey K
Banned
If I was MS I would offer it on PS+ day 1 for free, but on the contingency that Sony pays them 55.99 USD per download.
Sony could decide what thier priorities are at that point.
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The massive imbalance of Sony being far away the market leader and MS being well behind, with all the advantages and disadvantages that provides those positions. Have you honestly not noticed, or are you just pretending that you haven’t to justify thinking this deal shouldn’t go ahead?
You talk about exogenous resources like this is the only time it’s happened in the industry. It’s been well commented on that Sony as a whole have helped Playstation out a number of times in the past, notably at launch and during the PS3 era when it was burning money. Microsoft should be allowed to do the same.
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DForce
NaughtyDog Defense Force
Microsoft has been acquiring time exclusives since the early 2000s, so I don't need to go back to the 90s. Different discussions can happen in the same thread.
It doesn't harm normal gaming consumers? LOL.
COD biggest market is on PlayStation and you're saying it won't harm normal gaming consumers? I swear, you Xbox fans say some of the most ridiculous things and you expect us to take you seriously lol.
Kagey K
Banned
It's fine. Sony relying on the Financial division to prop up Playstation and selling multiple pieces of real estate is good.
Ms using profits from other divisions to help propel Xbox is bad.
Bias at its finest.
It was all good to make fun of MS 1st party when they had 5 studios. Now that they beefed up you can see some ppl getting nervous.
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3liteDragon
Member
Who decides what's "enough money" now? Who decides what's "enough money" after?
DarkMage619
$MSFT
Blah blah blah all you can do is name call. You were wrong plain and simple again proving you don't know what you are talking about. Game pass is an additional way for consumers to access games. Selling retail versions of games through a traditional model doesn't preclude them from ALSO putting a title on Game pass. It is the same market. It is called an option. Options are good.
Also they are SELLING the games not 'giving them away' so apparently you do not know how stores work either. MS has been selling their games on non Xbox platforms for years now. Minecraft, many Bethesda titles, Ori, and soon CoD are all sold both on Xbox and other consoles too. You think that because they sell in multiple places they are not even competing with Sony and Nintendo anymore? If that is true why fight the acquisition at all right? Just let MS buy Activision and stop complaining.
Wait so not you aren't talking about anti-trust complaints against MS from the 90s? This thread is about the Activision acquisition. I don't even know what you are talking about anymore. Who said MS doesn't get timed exclusives? Tomb Raider caused some Sony fans to lose their minds. We all remember that and that was business too plain and simple.
No this acquisition doesn't harm normal gaming consumers. It gives anyone who isn't anti-Microsoft ways to play Activision games without having to buy them traditionally. More options are good. It also gives Switch owners access to CoD when they haven't had it in a long time. You keep acting like MS hasn't said repeatedly that CoD is staying on PlayStation so MS will be able to benefit from those gamers too. Again no harm. You talk about Xbox fans but it appears you haven't even been paying attention to this process. Why should anyone take YOU seriously?
Kagey K
Banned
Who cares? Big brokers like that buy and sell the same shares multiple times a day at .008c profit.
They have to trade on volume to be making money.
They buy every drop and sell every spike regardless of how small it is.
Panajev2001a
GAF's Pleasant Genius
(Extreme metaphor) What do you mean that carpet bombing a town is different than murdering a family? A killing is a killing.
Helping during financial hardships not to lose competitiveness vs getting closer to the $80 Billion mark to buy the biggest publishers to try to content starve your main competitor… yeah, we can all see the bias in your comparison and..
… ok it is ok, you do not care much beyond petty console war revenge. Oh well…
DenchDeckard
Moderated wildly
Cut him some slack. He's been pre occupied keeping us informed of the latest XSS deals
I'll pass. He lost material credibility months ago when he used his "lawyer math" logic to explain why Activision's dip in stock price was not indicative market skepticism of the deal going through. The idea of many his viewers buying into such an absurd and illogical concept makes me nauseous to this day.
But is he right or not? Is there another lawyer who can debunk what he is saying as not of logical lawyer mentality or is it just more of us who, let's admit it are clueless?
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