Not sure why you’re struggling to understand how the negotiations work. These are some of the same issues being raised with the ABK acquisition and the negotiation power it would potentially give Microsoft.
And there will be no negotiations once the acquisition is closed. That is why its being looked into, because you know, it would give one party actual market power over properties that are seen as important to the overall industry.
Right now Microsoft are free to go the negotiation table at the same time as Sony when negotiating 3rd party deals, they are free to offer different terms, more money (of which they have plenty of), whatever they need to in order to secure deals. That's exactly how Microsoft get 3rd party marketing deals of their own, timed exclusives, gamepass day one deals, etc.
If one company owns the majority of the revenue producing property in an industry then it removes the opportunity for other parties to negotiate deals that would be seen as mutually beneficial. All current 3rd party marketing deals, exclusives, etc get agreed upon because they are seen as mutually beneficial, no other reason.
If Xbox can't figure out a way to provide favourable terms to 3rd parties without needing to resort to buying them outright then that's on them. They've been in the industry long enough and have more resources than Sony and Nintendo put together, so please spare me the sob story.
Sony can put all kinds of stuff into these deals because they know publishers would rather go with them and have a larger marketing push and reach a larger audience than they would with Xbox. This is extremely basic negotiating 101.
See above, Xbox are still free to negotiate for these deals and do what's necessary in order to secure them. They had no issue in the 360 era when Sony were in an
even more dominant position coming off the PS2 generation. It's not Sony's or anyone else's fault that as a business division Xbox have lost their focus since then.
Or you can be like the other poster with their fingers in their ears, lalalalallala they don’t need to make these deals and the publishers don’t even want them in GamePass and yet the stipulations continue to be put into the deals. I guess Sony just likes throwing money out for no reason
Well clearly in certain circumstances publishers/developers don't want gamepass enough. If they did then they would say no on the basis of the clause.
If you think stipulations in deals are not an industry wide standard then I have a bridge to sell to you. It's going to be really funny when contracts from other platform holders end up out in the open. People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.
Also, Xbox gets some deals because a lot of games get released and Sony doesn’t snatch up all of them. Again, pretty basic logic.
But I thought big bad Sony were throwing their weight around exercising their "market power" and making things difficult for Xbox? Can't be that bad if Xbox are still managing to get 3rd party marketing deals, day one gamepass games and 3rd party exclusives of their own.
