Pollux
Member
The one that really fits is Paradox
Microsoft / Activision Deal Approval Watch |OT| (MS/ABK close)
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The one that really fits is Paradox
Dick Jones
Banned
I was really getting at if someone keeps lying you'd tend to not believe anything they say. You don't pick and choose what to believe from a habitual liar.
There will be no PS6 native COD game, and the Free to Play Warzone game will be pushed for a few years near the end of this gen's life cycle so only Next gen COD is on Xbox.
The 10 year deal will be a few yearly releases with the last PS5 game until the year before NeXtbox releases. Push Warzone and wait out the clock until the 10 years is up.
StreetsofBeige
Gold Member
Is that 10 year offer from MS still on the table? Or did Sony balk and MS took it back?
Dick Jones
Banned
Square Enix also sold off alot of IP for peanuts so you could offer magic beans for the company and they would think about it. I hope the next president is not a fucking idiot like the current one. SE needs to remain independent
Heisenberg007
Gold Journalism
Just reading this is an awful experience.
If all this stuff happens -- which it will -- the industry will be in a horrible, horrible shape.
- Zenimax / ABK games exclusive to Xbox.
- SE / Capcom games exclusive to Sony.
- Ubisoft / Take Two owned by Tencent. (could possibly become exclusive to Tencent HW).
- Other IPs exclusive to Amazon Luna and Meta.
GHG
Gold Member
Topher
Identifies as young
Does it even matter? Phil Spencer stated multiple times they were not taking COD from PlayStation.
ToadMan
Member
One thing to remember the regulators are regulating all the time, not just before an acquisition.
If, after the fact, MS changed track to the extent Sony could demonstrate they had been harmed by the acquisition, the regulators can revisit and force a divestment.
So MS are locked in to do what they've committed to. The question is what combination of words and actions will work to harm competition without being enough for subsequent legal action.
We've heard that "financial incentive" phrasing a lot yet here we are.
Kvally
Member
Phil said COD is on PS for as long as PS exists. That is free money printing for MS. No doubt they want that printing right into their bank accounts.
The next few weeks are going to be interesting to see Sony's answer.
If they consider chances to get this blocked now zero I think the next couple of weeks they might decide to formally sign a deal with MS before regulators final decisions are made.
Microsoft cannot withdraw from their words and what they proposed before judgement and I think Sony won't trust Microsoft's good faith here. They might try to get the best deal they can ink on paper before final decisions are made.
If they consider chances to get this blocked now zero I think the next couple of weeks they might decide to formally sign a deal with MS before regulators final decisions are made.
Microsoft cannot withdraw from their words and what they proposed before judgement and I think Sony won't trust Microsoft's good faith here. They might try to get the best deal they can ink on paper before final decisions are made.
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SlimySnake
Flashless at the Golden Globes
If Sony doesnt go and buy Take2 and use GTA as a bargaining chip then I just dont see Sony continue to be the force they are today.
The CoD pie affects everything from their PS+ subs to their digital store sales to ALL the F2P and other shooter audience cod has helped them cultivate. Will fortnite be as big on PS with half of the CoD audience gone? Doubt it.
Sony will have to severely downscale their operations to match what Nintendo is doing. Cheaper hardware. Way fewer AAA first party games. Way cheaper games. They wont have any money for third party exclusives like FF which is a good thing for those of us who hate moneyhats but you just know MS will sweep in to get those moneyhats so I dont see Sony getting many more FF games, at least on day one.
Nintendo is still very successful with their handheld only approach, but tbh, they are as irrelevant to me as ouya. I want big AAA exclusives, not the small quirky stuff they put out nowadays with their only AAA games like Zeldas, Metroids and Marios taking 6+ years to make. If thats the Sony we have to settle for in the future then thats a depressing thought.
The most interesting thing to see would be exactly how soon this happens. Sony will be in denial for the first few years. they might even go buy Square Enix or some other smaller FPS studios. But everyone other than CMA knows that Sony is now on borrowed time. Without CoD, their revenue drops by 30% minimum and that will affect their bottomline. Investors will know this. I wonder if pressure is put on Sony to sell to Apple or Amazon.
GTA acquisition is the only thing that can help them retain their dominance but as of right now, even if Sony isnt going to die anytime soon and might even reinvent themselves like Nintendo did, they simply wont be the juggernaut they are today.
The CoD pie affects everything from their PS+ subs to their digital store sales to ALL the F2P and other shooter audience cod has helped them cultivate. Will fortnite be as big on PS with half of the CoD audience gone? Doubt it.
Sony will have to severely downscale their operations to match what Nintendo is doing. Cheaper hardware. Way fewer AAA first party games. Way cheaper games. They wont have any money for third party exclusives like FF which is a good thing for those of us who hate moneyhats but you just know MS will sweep in to get those moneyhats so I dont see Sony getting many more FF games, at least on day one.
Nintendo is still very successful with their handheld only approach, but tbh, they are as irrelevant to me as ouya. I want big AAA exclusives, not the small quirky stuff they put out nowadays with their only AAA games like Zeldas, Metroids and Marios taking 6+ years to make. If thats the Sony we have to settle for in the future then thats a depressing thought.
The most interesting thing to see would be exactly how soon this happens. Sony will be in denial for the first few years. they might even go buy Square Enix or some other smaller FPS studios. But everyone other than CMA knows that Sony is now on borrowed time. Without CoD, their revenue drops by 30% minimum and that will affect their bottomline. Investors will know this. I wonder if pressure is put on Sony to sell to Apple or Amazon.
GTA acquisition is the only thing that can help them retain their dominance but as of right now, even if Sony isnt going to die anytime soon and might even reinvent themselves like Nintendo did, they simply wont be the juggernaut they are today.
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Topher
Identifies as young
I agree. I think the 10 year deal was for the benefit of regulators more than anything else.
ToadMan
Member
I'm not buying it now.
I'll get the $1 version later - it will come to GP unless there is a greater regulatory hurdle we haven't yet seen.
Dick Jones
Banned
Microsoft don't think that way. They are thinking if they kill Playstation think of all that money they'd make.
This now opens a new situation without a doubt. MS would no longer be bound to Sony by order of the regulator....it would now be bound simply by its own word
My bet is that we will soon see the announcement of the 10-year agreement between MS and Sony amicably for the benefit of both.
PS. . The rest of the ABK franchises are entirely up to MS's own decision.
My bet is that we will soon see the announcement of the 10-year agreement between MS and Sony amicably for the benefit of both.
PS. . The rest of the ABK franchises are entirely up to MS's own decision.
Name a first party published MS title not on GP.
Punished Miku
Human Rights Subscription Service
Nobody can claim MS gaming division isn't profitable now. That's the point. They are now a self-sufficient division. King and Activision, and a slowly growing Gamepass. They're fine with people spending money on Call of Duty on any system.
They can say every E3 Call of Duty is on GP day 1, and market it on Xbox for free. But they're happy with you buying it anywhere. They don't want to disrupt Call of Duty community at all. It's a miracle that people even want to buy these games every single year. They'll never touch it unless GP is at Netflix levels, and it wouldn't matter.
Dick Jones
Banned
The Nintendo game is promised as native not cloud.
Drell
Member
So we went from Nintendo owning most of the gaming landscape to them being kinda 50/50 with Sega, to Sony dominating the industry for 2 generations but with strong exclusivities on each competitors platforms, to Microsoft becoming equal to Sony and the gaming landscape shifting to multisupport. Then Sony took back the leadership but still in this multisupport dynamic. And now we're enterning in the corporate consolidation era with Sony still dominating for now...Just reading this is an awful experience.
If all this stuff happens -- which it will -- the industry will be in a horrible, horrible shape.
- Zenimax / ABK games exclusive to Xbox.
- SE / Capcom games exclusive to Sony.
- Ubisoft / Take Two owned by Tencent. (could possibly become exclusive to Tencent HW).
- Other IPs exclusive to Amazon Luna and Meta.
skit_data
Member
It's quickly becoming a lose-lose situation for most gamers indeed. We were (possibly) seeing some sort of precedent being set regarding titles being kept multiplat (Minecraft, Bungie) but seeing how exclusivity is seemingly dropped here I'm leaning more towards beforementioned lose-lose situation.
Still there, unsure if behavioural concessions is enough
On the cma document,
- they realised that the partial foreclosure element of degrading the quality on ps was overplayed and consumers would still buy/play cod
- they realised that they had done the maths wrong but I need to dig in deeper. They definitely didn't agree with both but they realised that they have accounted for COD users twice in the LTV and they had used data from a period of higher engagement re new console release.
- COD ain't minecraft re the likely strategy
- Losing cod revenue is likely to be bigger than the long term benefits re new users and gp revenue.
feynoob
Banned
Welcome to the future.
Topher
Identifies as young
So you think Ferguson is just wrong?
SteelCurtain 59
Member
There's very little reason for Microsoft to take cof off playstation. They can make Xbox cod the best version, have it be on game pass, have some cool game pass perks, timed exclusive content, they could even have Xbox ads on the main menu, or maybe even require making an Xbox account to play the playstation version. The COD fans will switch in droves for the better version, anybody with both consoles would get it on Xbox for game pass or the better version, and Microsoft would still get money from the playstation fans who refuse to switch
Snake29
Banned
Lol they don't care about all the other cloud companies which they gave a 10 year CoD. It's just for the show and nothing more. Do you think that they care about these no named cloud services with a handfull of subscriptions.
Like i said, it was all for the show. As long as Nintendo doesn't get the same version, then nobody is going to bother. But MS can say "hey at least we gave them and those no named cloud services:".
Sony still has a market position issue. Are regulators worldwide really going to let the market leader acquire publishers to explicitly foreclosure their competitors?
Dick Jones
Banned
So you are saying they should do everything Sony claimed they'd do and Microsoft denied?
Topher
Identifies as young
Phil Spencer has said PlayStation will get the same version of COD that Xbox gets.
SoloKingRobert
Banned
Hopefully, Microsoft starts to bring back old Franchises like True Crime, Guitar Hero, Blur, Skylanders etc..
adamsapple
Or is it just one of Phil's balls in my throat?
I don't think it will be an issue at all in Japan at least.
DeepEnigma
Gold Member
Has nothing to do with Japanese law. No regulator on the planet would approve Microsoft buying Sony to become a console monopoly.
You're pretty much describing things that are already happening.
Bumblebeetuna
Member
The sub service strategy that will be just a small, less than 20% pool of their gaming revenue? They'll still rely mostly on regular sales.
The cloud services will just get the PC version it won't affect anyone l.
Kvally
Member
Forza Motorsport. I also am not sure if MS has all of the Zenimax/Bethesda games on Game Pass yet. Ghostwire is also not on Game Pass yet.
Topher
Identifies as young
Hopefully, Microsoft starts to bring back old Franchises like True Crime, Guitar Hero, Blur, Skylanders etc..
Make it happen, Phil
Punished Miku
Human Rights Subscription Service
Diablo IV of course will come to GP. But probably not day 1 since all this stuff is still being finalized.
Topher
Identifies as young
CMA backed down.
Thats if sony signs the deal if not they will get COD but face what xbox does now with exclusive xp boosts and other perks.
Heisenberg007
Gold Journalism
This is a new benchmark that will accelerate the consolidation. Things were never this bad.
ABK is already the biggest acquisition in the gaming industry. If this was blocked, consolidation would have slowed down. No company would think of buying a publisher Take Two because ABK got blocked. Now you can bet that someone will approach and buy Take Two sooner or later, because ABK won't be independent.
Dick Jones
Banned
Phil says a lot of things.
Topher
Identifies as young
Not true. Phil never said it was dependent on a signed deal at all.
GHG
Gold Member
It's best you read the document:
https://assets.publishing.service.g...ion_Addendum_PFs__For_Publication_230324_.pdf
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