Microsoft is trying to acquire Activision Blizzard (UPDATE: CMA says NO!).

[Girth Certificate]

1 minute ago, Benny said:

 

Absolutely, it's a lot like that, but even better.

 

yaaas

 

 

Sony's future, yesterday

[FishyFish]

Minecraft stayed multi-platform when Microsoft paid a huge amount for Mojang. I expect COD will too, but with exclusive content and the like for Xbox customers.

 

While making COD exclusive might pay off in terms of attracting people to Xbox, it also risks a lot of bad feeling. People don't tend to like being extorted into buying a specific piece of kit when they previously had choice. Whether that's enough to counter the balance though, I don't know.

 

There could be other commercial aspect at play too. E.g. I'm not sure what cloud provider Sony uses for PSN, but if it's Azure, then damaging Sony's console business also risks reducing the demand from a big customer of MS cloud services. That's just a theoretical example, but large businesses like this tend to be above the C0nsole WarZ stuff when it comes to making money. Competitors can often be both customers and suppliers.

[RubberJohnny]

Minecraft is a single continuously supported game, CoD is a discrete series of titles. Old titles won't be going away, and continuously supported titles like Warzone will stay multi, but new releases will be exclusive.

 

Basically the same as the Bethesda deal.

[monkeydog]

2 minutes ago, FishyFish said:

Minecraft stayed multi-platform when Microsoft paid a huge tiny amount for Mojang

 

Fixed that for you.

[Giddas]

JUST KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF WORDLE MICROSOFT, I'M NOT LOADING THAT IN CRAPPY EDGE

[RubberJohnny]

4 minutes ago, bear said:

I think you are mixing up Sega and Konami here based on the organised crime reference. 

 

LOL nope, Sega has had lawsuits in recent years over the use of "black company" tactics like harassing staff, they kidnapped a developers girlfriend to stop him from leaving the company in the late 90s. They've always been the shittiest company on every level and it's baffling why people have any affection for them.

 

The theft of the Dreamcast dev hardware which broke the system open for piracy were even pretty obviously organised crime elements inside the company who wanted to get in on the Hong Kong bootleg disc money train, only for the newly popular internet to steal their lunch in turn.

[Sarlaccfood]

Huge news to wake up to, it’s getting to the point where it would have been cheaper for MS to just buy Sony surely?

 

Great outcome for the Activision employees, as the whole “Bobby’s going nowhere” thing was so utterly depressing and hopefully can set a better example out to the wider industry when they make him sling his hook. 

 

 

[Flanders]

Is no one else a bit depressed by this then? Feels like there’s a bit of mass denial going on about the not even long term implications.
 

Talk of what companies Sony can buy…there isn’t going to be a PlayStation console or even service of any kind in 10 years unless Sony gets bought by fucking Apple or Amazon.
 

And I think people who assume Nintendo will carry on in rude health when ruthless megacorps have bought up the rest of the industry in which they operate are completely delusional, to be honest. 
 

 

[Strafe]

12 minutes ago, yakumo said:

WOW.

He said activision only puts out call of duty (in itself not exactly accurate) but the deal buys blizzard (and King!) who have some huge franchises.

[Mr. Gerbik]

14 minutes ago, Thor said:

Okay, so they have that licence, my suggestion of buying Square Enix still stands if they have the presently have the licences for Avengers and GotG (maybe they don't any more, as was suggested

Microsoft could simply license those from Disney just like Squeenix have done if they wanted. No need to buy an entire company for that!

 

Squeenix don't "have the license", they made a deal with Disney to make an X amount of games on certain Marvel ip.

[RubberJohnny]

Just now, Flanders said:

And I think people who assume Nintendo will carry on in rude health when ruthless megacorps have bought up the rest of the industry in which they operate are completely delusional, to be honest. 

 

Would you say Nintendo are Doomed? I'd add that to the "list of common internet arguments with less going for them than flat earth" at this point.

[Stanley]

1 hour ago, Quest said:

My friend who bought a PS5 just for playing CoD is not going to like this news at all.

 

I'll be happy if this somehow results in Singularity being playable on the Series X. I'm a simple man.

 

Tbh anyone buying a PS5 right now to play third party games hasn’t really got a clue. 

[gossi the dog]

1 hour ago, Doctor Shark said:

 

This is the image Microsoft are using to promote this deal.

 

6 franchises on show. 4 of them Blizzard, only one Activision. It's obvious who they wanted out of the deal.

 

Meh. This is as uninspiring as the acquisition of Bethesda.

[Thor]

3 minutes ago, Mr. Gerbik said:

Microsoft could simply license those from Disney just like Squeenix have done if they wanted. No need to buy an entire company for that!

 

Squeenix don't "have the license", they made a deal with Disney to make an X amount of games on certain Marvel ip.

That's a license.

[Down by Law]

10 minutes ago, Strafe said:

He said activision only puts out call of duty (in itself not entirely accurate) but the deal buys blizzard (and King!) who have some huge franchises.

 

I don't think i've ever played a King game, they just make mobile stuff. Blizzard makes Overwatch and Diablo - not my cuppa tea.  All the other Activision developers I liked such as Raven now toil away in the CoD salt mines. Sekiro was the last Activision game I bought but it's about as much an Activision product as the Witcher III is to Bandai Namco.

 

I mean look at this image

 

 

Treyarch , Raven, High Moon, Beenox, SledgeHammer, Infinity Ward and Toys for Bob all make Call of Duty content ! 

 

Yes this is a big purchase as far as slinging money around goes but Bethesda was far more interesting a purchase from a gaming, not a business point of view IMO.

[Giddas]

Yes not that many Activision franchises I'm interested in either, but a lot of people are.

 

 

[evilashchris]

We might get a Blackthorne sequel now, awww yisss.

[Strafe]

1 hour ago, Quest said:

My friend who bought a PS5 just for playing CoD is not going to like this news at all.

 

Anyone who buys a PS5 solely for playing CoD deserves everything they get, tbh.

[kensei]

37 minutes ago, moosegrinder said:

 

They tried to buy Nintendo before ages ago and got laughed at. Seeing as the Switch has matched Wii sales I can't imagine that changing.

 

Nintendo are publicly traded, so Microsoft could just buy up shares. Nintendo's market capitalisation is about $50 billion, so maybe to actually get it you are going way above the 70 odd here. Competition concerns with Nintendo having their own platform might be serious.

 

You might also worry about losing talent, but Microsoft are interested in IP. If Nintendo's entire back catalogue was on gamepass, they could double the cost and I'm paying it forever.

 

It just seems odd they are going for more of the same types of games. 

 

I know the Games Publishing industry goes through a lot of busts and mergers but does seem like the number of big publishers is really narrowing.

[Giddas]

17 minutes ago, RubberJohnny said:

 

LOL nope, Sega has had lawsuits in recent years over the use of "black company" tactics like harassing staff, they kidnapped a developers girlfriend to stop him from leaving the company in the late 90s. They've always been the shittiest company on every level and it's baffling why people have any affection for them.

 

The theft of the Dreamcast dev hardware which broke the system open for piracy were even pretty obviously organised crime elements inside the company who wanted to get in on the Hong Kong bootleg disc money train, only for the newly popular internet to steal their lunch in turn.

 

Where's this kidnapped girlfriend thing come from? Are you confusing Sega with the plot of Double Dragon?

[Triple A]

16 minutes ago, Sarlaccfood said:

Great outcome for the Activision employees, as the whole “Bobby’s going nowhere” thing was so utterly depressing and hopefully can set a better example out to the wider industry when they make him sling his hook. 

Not so sure about that.

Yeah Bobby might go soon but so may a lot of other staff.  I can see MSFT centralising a lot of publishing services in Redmond.

[kensei]

6 minutes ago, Down by Law said:

 

I don't think i've ever played a King game, they just make mobile stuff. Blizzard makes Overwatch and Diablo - not my cuppa tea.  All the other Activision developers I liked such as Raven now toil away in the CoD salt mines. Sekiro was the last Activision game I bought but it's about as much an Activision product as the Witcher III is to Bandai Namco.

 

I mean look at this image

 

 

Treyarch , Raven, High Moon, Beenox, SledgeHammer, Infinity Ward and Toys for Bob all make Call of Duty content ! 

 

Yes this is a big purchase as far as slinging money around goes but Bethesda was far more interesting a purchase from a gaming, not a business point of view IMO.

 

Do any mean they all continuously have to make CoD content going forward. Do Activision only anything interesting in their back catalogue?

[Bacon Horsemeat]

Consolidation is not good for gamers

[JPL]

44 minutes ago, kensei said:

At that money, why didn't they go after Nintendo? That would gives gives types of games they don't have, rather more of those that do. Competition concerns?

 

If it was, surely Capcom / Atlus / Konami / Square would have been a better bet?

Who says that's not on the cards next?

[Robo_1]

For me this level of acquisition does raise broader questions about the existence of these enormous tech companies, who could if they chose, simply buy their way into virtually any market they like and destroy the competition through sheer force of spending power. MS have more than earned their seat at the gaming table and I think they've had a tremendously positive influence on the industry overall but when they're in a position to invest at a level which is just so far above that of their rivals, it does raise concerns.

 

It's not about console wars or any one company, this is the nature of the beast but some of these tech companies wield so much power and influence already, I'm anxious about seeing them become increasingly dominant in more and more industries.

[Quest]

2 minutes ago, Giddas said:

 

Where's this kidnapped girlfriend thing come from? Are you confusing Sega with the plot of Double Dragon?

 

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2015/11/rumour_leading_japanese_game_company_kidnapped_devs_sister_to_stop_them_from_working_with_nintendo

[Alex W.]

20 minutes ago, Flanders said:

Is no one else a bit depressed by this then? Feels like there’s a bit of mass denial going on about the not even long term implications.
 

Talk of what companies Sony can buy…there isn’t going to be a PlayStation console or even service of any kind in 10 years unless Sony gets bought by fucking Apple or Amazon.
 

And I think people who assume Nintendo will carry on in rude health when ruthless megacorps have bought up the rest of the industry in which they operate are completely delusional, to be honest. 
 

 

It really should be as existentially unsettling as Disney buying basically everything, but aside from some intensely awful cross media hypercontent, that has just become part of the accepted reality of how media works. I think we’re all just so exhausted by the gradual consolidation of everything in to a handful of careless megacorps that it doesn’t even register any more, so long as they make things convenient and don’t explicitly meddle with the brand image of their component parts.

 

I suppose on the up side it’s nice that a publisher got acquired while they were still in health instead of the usual route of crashing to earth shedding cash and staff until a bigger publisher comes along and absorbs the weaker one.

[Cyhwuhx]

1 minute ago, Robo_1 said:

For me this level of acquisition does raise broader questions about the existence of these enormous tech companies, who could if they chose, simply buy their way into virtually any market they like and destroy the competition through sheer force of spending power. MS have more than earned their seat at the gaming table and I think they've had a tremendously positive influence on the industry overall but when they're in a position to invest at a level which is just so far above that of their rivals, it does raise concerns.

 

It's not about console wars or any one company, this is the nature of the beast but some of these tech companies wield so much power and influence already, I'm anxious about seeing them become increasingly dominant in more and more industries.

 

Megacorps are the (80s scifi) future.

[RubberJohnny]

3 minutes ago, Giddas said:

Where's this kidnapped girlfriend thing come from? Are you confusing Sega with the plot of Double Dragon?

 

Ah, looks like it was sister rather than girlfriend, but here:

 

Quote

Before we fully recount this disturbing and almost unbelievable tale, it's worth pointing a few things out. The following interview is found in John Szczepaniak's book The Untold History of Japanese Game Developers Volume 2, and many of the names are redacted for legal reasons. Szczepaniak also interviewed the source under the agreement of complete anonymity.

 

The interviewee - speaking under the catch-all pseudonym Hideo Nanashi (the interview in question is in fact an amalgamation of several interviews with different people) - talks to Szczepaniak about cancelled titles and other topics before addressing what has to be one of the most explosive stories in the entire book - his sibling's abduction by gangsters at the behest of a leading Japanese game maker, which shall remain nameless:

 

Quote

My younger sister was kidnapped. [REDACTED] hired some gangsters to do it. They did it to make me stop cooperating with Nintendo.

 

In Japan, you have these evil companies that always crop up, and unlike the West, in Japan there's a perception that "play" is bad, the opposite of hard work. So amusement-oriented industries inevitably become infested with evil companies and ties to the underworld. Take arcades, for example. In legal terms, they're covered under laws regarding the entertainment and amusement trades. So they're managed under the same laws that regulate the adult, or "pink", industry. Because of that, the underworld gets involved. The only companies that have been able to do business while staying clean are probably Nintendo and Namco.

 

 

People in the comments put together that the company was obviously Sega, as there weren't exactly that many that fit the bill and they'd had various lawsuits about their issues.

[Thor]

1 minute ago, Robo_1 said:

For me this level of acquisition does raise broader questions about the existence of these enormous tech companies, who could if they chose, simply buy their way into virtually any market they like and destroy the competition through sheer force of spending power.

We're on the brink of megacorps from dystopian sci-fi. In a different industry, all cars in the future will be driverless, and provided by an Amazon/Google subscription, tracking your every move in said vehicle.