Kerotan
Member
Well by a Chinese company at least.
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Next company that could be acquired by Sony? Or MS?
- Thread starter Oddvintagechap
- Start date
- Poll
Kagoshima_Luke
Gold Member
I just voted for Bungie.
BennyBlanco
aka IMurRIVAL69
Are you suggesting that they’re teasing a multi billion dollar tenuous business deal on twitter?
Dick Jones
Gold Member
SameI just voted for Bungie.
Yoboman
Member
Not wanting a hostile takeover =/= not wanting an acquisition
ChuckeRearmed
Member
Out of all publishers Microsoft will go after Capcom or Sega. Ubisoft would be a good deal for Amazon.
ATVI acquisition changed the market.
ATVI acquisition changed the market.
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Swift_Star
Banned
People still believe this crap?
fersnake
Member
Swift_Star
Banned
How many times must we tell you? MS is not able to buy a big Japanese company. The Japanese government won’t let them buy either Capcom or sega.
Mibu no ookami
Banned
Namco Bandai is as poor a purchase as Konami and Square Enix.
Sega and Capcom are the only major Japanese companies even worth taking a look at and that’s not saying much.
FromSoftware isn’t worth the price tag.
CDPR makes the most sense for many reasons.
Outside of CDPR you really need to open the wallet for Take Two.
Sega and Capcom are the only major Japanese companies even worth taking a look at and that’s not saying much.
FromSoftware isn’t worth the price tag.
CDPR makes the most sense for many reasons.
Outside of CDPR you really need to open the wallet for Take Two.
Dick Jones
Gold Member
Smart move to piggyback on the acquisition shite for free pr before Elden Ring release. I dont believe anything more than marketing and isn't Elden Ring marketing tied to PS?
ChuckeRearmed
Member
You forgot /s at the end
Yoboman
Member
What value does Sega have? They've lost most of their talent, their IPs are irrelevant in 2021. All they bring is nostalgia and Atlus
DaedalusGrim
Banned
Sony × Capcom seems like a pretty good partnership. Makes sense IP wise, lots of history there. IMO anyway.
Captain Toad
Banned
Which is why Microsoft (or Sony) would go after them. No one wants Amazon crashing this party.
And I don't see anyone buying any of these Japanese studios people keep mentioning.
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assurdum
Banned
Wait you really believe Japanese companies can be bought by MS? I put a big if on Sega or Platinum Games but outside them, honestly I think it's almost impossible and very remote. They haven't big sympathy for the western monopoly.
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ChuckeRearmed
Member
I think Ubisoft would be a necessary sacrifice for further publisher acquisitions.
For Sony it doesn't make sense as Ubisoft is just too big and they will have to clean the house, then they will have to put all those 20k+ employees on payroll (keep in mind that Ubisoft has issue with underpaying the employees so Sony will have to deal with that too).
Amazon has much bigger amount of money and would be just easier to swallow it. Also Amazon has Luna and already has there Ubisoft+ channel, so there is some level of integration there. And all those 20k employees will immediately allow Amazon to gain a big gaming division. Game Pass potentially can lose Ubisoft+ games though.
Microsoft is in a situation where it does not really need Ubisoft anymore. Getting Ubisoft+ on Game Pass, would be nice but they will get a better deal if they go after Warner Bros. For Microsoft the ideal scenario is Capcom, T2 and Sega. And basically nothing else (aside studios).
Oh, so you are saying that seriously.
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Captain Toad
Banned
And he's right.
Or did you think it was a coincidence that with all of the acquisitions going on, none are Japanese studios (unless a smaller part of a Western publisher purchase)?
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Why couldn’t they be bought?
Swift_Star
Banned
Yes, he does and you know the reason why he does.
You're deluded.
Swift_Star
Banned
Because regulation? Capcom and Sega are big in Japan, they wouldn't allow them to be bought by a western company. No chance of that happening.
Tams
Member
Because Japanese government regulators can ultimately just say no.
The law effectively only fully protects the massive zaibatsus/keiretsus, but smaller companies can also be shielded from foreign buy outs, just like in any country. If there's a will to prevent them, then they will be prevented.
And before someone goes, but in the UK... or something, the Conservatives would sell their own grandmothers.
Sega Orphan
Banned
For MS I think they are just looking at smaller studios compared to any publisher.
To me their targets should be :
1. Avalanche Studios. They are doing a MS exclusive game in Contraband, and have a good working relationship with id where they made Rage 2 with them. In a recent interview Avalanche were saying how it made sense to partner with MS for Contraband. This seems like a no brainer.
2. Asobo Studios. While I doubt there is any movement here, as Asobo has said they want to remain independent and signed a deal with Focus, their work on Flight Sim was amazing, and they will be doing the ongoing work with that game for years to come. They also showed with a Plagues Tale that they are very good at producing a stunning looking third person narrative based game that MS needs more of. Low chance of happening, but if they were to sell I would assume MS would get them.
3. Platinum Studios. There were rumours that MS were in talks to buy them a few years ago, but Platinum decided they wanted to stay independent. Now they are saying they would be interested in selling if they could stay independent. We know Phil has stated that he wants more Japanese Studios in their teams, so it makes sense to me. Phil doesn't hold grudges, so I don't think anything would stop them.
4. I would have said Techland previously due to their technical abilities, after seeing Dying Light 2, I dont think they offer MS anything. I expect that State Of Decay 3 is going to be a massive, massive step up from an Indie game to a AAA game, and that will give MS a good Zombie game.
5. IO Interactive. MS was in talks with them years ago which never panned out, but I think it could be revisited. The Hitman franchise would be one MS would like to own, it already has a movie about it, and there is a good amount of previous games which could be added to GP straight away.
For Sony I think the following.
1. Sloclap. They showed their dev chops with Sifu, and I think Sony would like to keep them exclusive going forward. Sifu is only a timed exclusive so maybe if Sony buys them they can stop it getting released on Xbox?
They wouldn't be expensive either.
2. From Software. If Sony can get these guys on board it would pretty much make the PS the best place to experience that Japanese style of gaming. They couldn't allow MS to get them. Imagine all From games not coming to PS?
3. Square Enix. Obviously they are tight, and have a ton of IP and historical game library. With Sony bringing their own version of GP out soon, having access to the entire Square library to add to it would be crazy good.
4. Kojima. Well, why not? They wouldn't want MS teaming up with him.
To me their targets should be :
1. Avalanche Studios. They are doing a MS exclusive game in Contraband, and have a good working relationship with id where they made Rage 2 with them. In a recent interview Avalanche were saying how it made sense to partner with MS for Contraband. This seems like a no brainer.
2. Asobo Studios. While I doubt there is any movement here, as Asobo has said they want to remain independent and signed a deal with Focus, their work on Flight Sim was amazing, and they will be doing the ongoing work with that game for years to come. They also showed with a Plagues Tale that they are very good at producing a stunning looking third person narrative based game that MS needs more of. Low chance of happening, but if they were to sell I would assume MS would get them.
3. Platinum Studios. There were rumours that MS were in talks to buy them a few years ago, but Platinum decided they wanted to stay independent. Now they are saying they would be interested in selling if they could stay independent. We know Phil has stated that he wants more Japanese Studios in their teams, so it makes sense to me. Phil doesn't hold grudges, so I don't think anything would stop them.
4. I would have said Techland previously due to their technical abilities, after seeing Dying Light 2, I dont think they offer MS anything. I expect that State Of Decay 3 is going to be a massive, massive step up from an Indie game to a AAA game, and that will give MS a good Zombie game.
5. IO Interactive. MS was in talks with them years ago which never panned out, but I think it could be revisited. The Hitman franchise would be one MS would like to own, it already has a movie about it, and there is a good amount of previous games which could be added to GP straight away.
For Sony I think the following.
1. Sloclap. They showed their dev chops with Sifu, and I think Sony would like to keep them exclusive going forward. Sifu is only a timed exclusive so maybe if Sony buys them they can stop it getting released on Xbox?
They wouldn't be expensive either.
2. From Software. If Sony can get these guys on board it would pretty much make the PS the best place to experience that Japanese style of gaming. They couldn't allow MS to get them. Imagine all From games not coming to PS?
3. Square Enix. Obviously they are tight, and have a ton of IP and historical game library. With Sony bringing their own version of GP out soon, having access to the entire Square library to add to it would be crazy good.
4. Kojima. Well, why not? They wouldn't want MS teaming up with him.
Sega Orphan
Banned
People have to realise that these companies will sell way over their market caps.
Microsoft got a discount on ABK due to legal issues and their toxic work environments. Having said that they paid 68 billion.
If someone wanted to buy Ubisoft, they would pay a similar amount per dollar revenue as MS did for ABK.
So in 2020 ABKs revenue was 8.09 billion US, and Ubi in 2020 was 1.82 billion US. That's makes ABK 4.44 times the size of Ubi soft. Therefore to be around the same price as ABK it would cost over 15 Billion US to get them.
That puts them outside the reach of Sony, it also puts them outside of MS after their buyout of ABK (not financially, MS could pay that and not even notice it, but from a regulatory point of view).
That leaves it in the hands of Amazon, Google, Facebook, Apple and Disney.
Disney or Apple would be my bet.
Microsoft got a discount on ABK due to legal issues and their toxic work environments. Having said that they paid 68 billion.
If someone wanted to buy Ubisoft, they would pay a similar amount per dollar revenue as MS did for ABK.
So in 2020 ABKs revenue was 8.09 billion US, and Ubi in 2020 was 1.82 billion US. That's makes ABK 4.44 times the size of Ubi soft. Therefore to be around the same price as ABK it would cost over 15 Billion US to get them.
That puts them outside the reach of Sony, it also puts them outside of MS after their buyout of ABK (not financially, MS could pay that and not even notice it, but from a regulatory point of view).
That leaves it in the hands of Amazon, Google, Facebook, Apple and Disney.
Disney or Apple would be my bet.
Mibu no ookami
Banned
You can use their IP from across generations and bring them back with other studios.
Insomniac could make a sonic game.
Sucker Punch could make a great Shenmue remake.
Altus is on the way up right now in a big way. Can also retouch the original personas for people who got into it at 4 or 5.
That being said, they aren’t worth the price.
digital_ghost
Member
MS should acquire Neogaf and make us grind for a bazillion hours for animated flaming avatars.
*cough* halo infinite
*cough* halo infinite
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Yoboman
Member
Why would Insomniac go from a 20 million seller to Sonic
Why would Sucker Punch go from an 8 million seller to Spencer
Except for Sonic, Segas IP don't sell and have little to no value in the modern market. And even Sonic really isn't of much value
Team Andromeda
Member
LOL. SONY have tons of debt. They can't match or outspend MS.
Team Andromeda
Member
Sony is hundreds in billions in debt. They have no cash reserves and so need to borrow on their market value.
They aren't matching Xbox spending.
DaedalusGrim
Banned
You don't know how this stuff works, do you?
Most large publicly traded companies have debt, its not a big deal to them like it would be to a person.
Most large publicly traded companies have debt, its not a big deal to them like it would be to a person.
Borowski_1
Member
the way i see it:
MS: Ubisoft, Remedy, Asobo, Crytek, IOI, Avalanche
Sony: Kojima Productions, From Software, Ember Lab, CDPR
MS: Ubisoft, Remedy, Asobo, Crytek, IOI, Avalanche
Sony: Kojima Productions, From Software, Ember Lab, CDPR
kuncol02
Banned
Why would Sony want to spend ~7bln on CDPR to get one game every 5-6 years And store with old games that barely even pay it's own bills?
And why would CDPR would want to be bought by company that thrown them under a bus?
Mibu no ookami
Banned
Insomniac has multiple teams working on multiple IP. Sonic has far more market appeal and penetration than Ratchet and Clank. So it would make far more sense for them to work on Sonic than Ratchet and Clank.
I assume if Sony bought Sega that it would also get them the movie rights to Sonic and it is worth noting that the Sonic movie grossed 319 million at the box office on a budget of 85-90 million. Compare this to Ratchet and Clank for instance which grossed 14 million on a budget of 20 million. Sonic is orders of magnitude larger than Ratchet and Clank and Insomniac is orders of magnitude more adept at making 3D platformers than any studio at Sega.
Shenmue was a huge property for the Dreamcast which didn't sell very well. On PS2 Shenmue probably would have sold 5-10x more. If you look at Resident Evil 2 remake, there is evidence that a well made reboot/remake of classic proven IP can have tremendous success. Shenmue as a property also has the ability to cross over into multimedia. It has an animated series right now, but I think would do extremely well as a live-action tv-series and/movie.
Then you look at what could be done with a bigger budget for games like Yakuza and Phantasy Star and I think the sky is the limit. Yakuza could also do fairly well as a tv series.
Mind you I think Sega isn't worth buying, but had they kept Visual Concept it would be a no-brainer. I think they are worth buying over any other Japanese company not named Capcom. There are pros and cons of buying any Japanese company at this point, but I'd say Sega makes a moderate amount of sense.
Makes a lot of sense
Capcom
Makes a moderate amount of sense
Sega
Kadokawa/FromSoftware
Makes little sense
Square Enix
Makes absolutely no sense
Bandai Namco
Konami
Koei Tecmo
Mibu no ookami
Banned
I agree with this, but I think the problem with Ubi Soft is they aren't really worth buying for Microsoft. I think EA or Tencent are much more likely.
cHaOs667
Member
If Microsoft makes his statement true to revive the old Activision IPs, think about what could be done with the EA back catalogue... Bring back Westwood, Origin, Maxis and others @MS
MidGenRefresh
*Refreshes biennially
Microsoft should acquire Ubisoft. Their games are a perfect match for Gamepass type of service.
Mibu no ookami
Banned
CDPR has a market cap of 4.63 billion. 7 billion is a bit extreme even with a premium. I think we're talking closer to 6 billion.
Both the Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk are absolutely massive games. If you compare them to Naughty Dog who is the current Sony crown jewel with maybe the exception of Bungie who I'm discounting because they are going to self-publish, CDPR would immediately become your biggest studio and you would immediately get 2 massive franchises to add to the PlayStation suite, and a genre that Sony isn't strong in. Witcher 3 sold 30 million copies and Cyberpunk has already sold 13.7 million copies. 43.7 million copies from one studio in essentially the span of a generation? That's significant.
As for GOG, you get the existing framework. It's not about the games currently in the store. You rebrand GOG to PlayStation Store and you immediately get an avenue into self-publishing on PC as well as royalties for other publishers on PC. PlayStation Store would be an immediate competitor for Steam and EGS, whereas if they created their own storefront they'd have to create that framework from scratch. Just like with Bungie it fast-forwards a key revenue strategy. Instead of paying Valve money to sell their games on Steam, they can sell their own games through GOG/PSN or some strategy of games releasing on GOG/PSN first and then eventually on Steam. Sony can also put a lot more money into GOG to make it a real competitor, whereas CDPR never had the money to do that.
Also Sony didn't throw them under the bus. They know their game was busted. If anything they threw Sony under the bus. But none of that is personal, it's business. What being owned by Sony allows CDPR is to stabilize their workforce and an influx of resources and collaborations. There is no way that Cyberpunk releases the way it was if it were a Sony first-party title. It would have just been delayed and sony would have eaten the cost. They released the game because they'd already paid for an expensive ad campaign and that in conjunction with the cost of developing the game for another year was too much for the heads of the studio, so they said F it and they released it. Those pressures don't really exist as a first-party studio, at least not to the same extent.
You look at the success stories of Sony 1st party studios and it shows the growth potential of any quality studio. Even Fumito Ueda was given every opportunity with Last Guardian.
Mibu no ookami
Banned
6.58 billion dollars for Ubi Soft to get Assassin's Creed and Tom Clancy? I'm not sure that that makes much sense at all.
Such a poor investment for such a lack of talent or strength of IP. You're also talking about extremely generic games to boot.
Mibu no ookami
Banned
If Microsoft makes his statement true to revive the old Activision IPs, think about what could be done with the EA back catalogue... Bring back Westwood, Origin, Maxis and others @MS
I get this feeling people think it's just about money, but it isn't.
First off Microsoft isn't going to put all its eggs into the video game basket. They just dropped 70 billion dollars (or at least plan to), which will probably be the last major acquisition from Microsoft.
If Microsoft were to try and buy EA anytime soon, regulators would not allow the sale to go through.
Also, you can't just "bring back" studios like they're IP.
T0kenAussie
Neo Member
I think you are more likely to see a big merger between the independents to make themselves big enough to take off the chessboard
MS won’t be spending 70B on a single purchase ever again. They may make a play at sega or capcom but who knows how that goes
MS won’t be spending 70B on a single purchase ever again. They may make a play at sega or capcom but who knows how that goes
T0kenAussie
Neo Member
The saudis and tencent are operating pretty freely in the JP gaming space
Mibu no ookami
Banned
Pros and Cons of buying FromSoftware/Kadokawa
Pros
Their games consistently sell well and consistently score well.
Sony has a relationship with them.
Cons
They don't own the rights to most of their games, no dark souls, no sekiro, no elden ring.
So you would be spending billions only to be left out of their most successful IP so they could continue demon's souls and bloodborne? Maybe some consideration from Armored Core, but overall it's not a great look even with PC releases.
If Kadokawa won't sell FromSoftware individually, then you're looking at 3 billion + premium to buy them. 4.2 billion dollars tied largely in one guy who could retire the next day or leave and start his own studio.
It's just not super wise.
Pros
Their games consistently sell well and consistently score well.
Sony has a relationship with them.
Cons
They don't own the rights to most of their games, no dark souls, no sekiro, no elden ring.
So you would be spending billions only to be left out of their most successful IP so they could continue demon's souls and bloodborne? Maybe some consideration from Armored Core, but overall it's not a great look even with PC releases.
If Kadokawa won't sell FromSoftware individually, then you're looking at 3 billion + premium to buy them. 4.2 billion dollars tied largely in one guy who could retire the next day or leave and start his own studio.
It's just not super wise.
Mibu no ookami
Banned
Let me know saudi investors or tencent buys a major Japanese company not just 5 or 10 percent of the company or buying a small studio.
MidGenRefresh
*Refreshes biennially
Nah, dude. They have loads of IPs and most importantly they have thousands of developers that can spit out title after title after title to make Gamepass even more attractive.
Far Cry
Assassin's Creed
Prince of Persia
Splinter Cell
Rayman
Just Dance
Watch Dogs
Rainbow Six
Ghost Recon
The Division
Anno
Might & Magic
The Settlers
+ many, many more
Mibu no ookami
Banned
Their games are in a huge free fall. It isn't just about quantity it's about quality and cost.
I can see them becoming EA Europe or something.
Ultimately, Microsoft and Sony aren't the only players here.
EA is potentially going to lose the FIFA license, they've lost Tiger Woods, they have no baseball game or basketball game. They have Madden and a failed Battlefield.
We're in an interesting time in gaming.
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