Game Companies Buying other Game Companies

[Jango]

Does that mean CTR Nitro-Fueled for PC?

[KHCast]

Also for anyone suggesting there’s nothing to worry about regarding the strikes, and workers trying to unionize, Microsoft isn’t someone I’d be optimistic about in that regard 

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-08-23/microsoft-bug-testers-unionized-then-they-were-dismissed

Certainly wouldn’t surprise me if this was a point of discussion between the two companies regarding this buyout 

[Tornado]

1 hour ago, Ryannumber1gamer said:

They've owned Minecraft for years. Warcraft isn't that big a deal because it's PC based. If I had to guess, if anything, it's better for WoW since it could mean the possibility of a console port, if Microsoft go that route.

In terms of the Blizzard games specifically, it's probably a net positive because Microsoft have more money to throw at them, and will have more of a reason to want to get them out the door ASAP. Plus, it's not unheard of for Microsoft to move teams around a little to help one another, bringing members from one team to another team for additional support. Overwatch could even possibly see some kind of support to tide it over until Overwatch 2, unlike the last few years where it's basically been left to die while they worked on OW2. 

Microsoft does do this temporarily to get assists when needed, but remember Activision had essentially already permanently dissolved all of their studios not working in the Call of Duty mines into the Rendering Tracer's Ass mines.

[Harkofthewaa]

While I may be an Xbox guy, I have to admit that this is rather disgusting. At what point do the anti trust sits come in because I feel like this is pretty close.

[CrownSlayers Shadow]

I heard this as a rumor several hours ago. Good lord did this become official fast on my end.

[Bobnik]

Y'know, I've never been monkey paw'd so hard in my life. I remember saying that Xbox doesn't really have a very strong first-party lineup for the future, and that Game Pass as a model does not sound particularly great if you want them to make a quality game. So I saw them getting new dev studios as somewhat of a positive. Then Bethesda buyout happened and I got kinda heated because they essentially made a bunch of multiplatform IPs Xbox-exclusive and that sucks. Also buying big publishers could lead to consolidation of the entire industry, which would also be really bad.

This is by far the worst it's ever been. I really hate this. I hate that "reevaluation" of partnership with ABK after all the allegations lead to this, I hate that this sets an even bigger precedence on the industry's consolidation and potentially monopolization, where huge companies gobble up huge publishers, smaller dev teams and whatever else they can get, I really hate that this is still being celebrated by a lot of people and/or now want Sony to start doing the same, which would be just as bad. I hate that a lot of multiplat IPs are gonna be Xbox platforms exclusive now. I hate that this puts workers in an arguably worse spot now because Microsoft also don't like unions. I hate that Bobby still gets a lot of cash out of this. I hate that he's still staying as CEO of ABK, at least temporarily (though I guess they can't just boot him till the deal is actually done). I hate that people have a foresight of a fucking mole and all they see is "Oooh, so new Crash/Spyro game?!", like fuck off, MS has been pretty bad with IPs they got from buying companies for years, there's nothing that tells me they of all companies are gonna be good with the newly acquired IPs. I hate pretty much everything about this.

 

The only potential positive that maybe could come from this is better working environment, but even then that is a huge task that can't be done in an instant. Also Bobby is still in the company so lmao.

 

Oh, also people that think they'll honor their word of "not all games gonna be Xbox-exclusive" - get off the copium, they said the exact same thing about Bethesda and yet both Starfield and Elder Scrolls 6, 2 of the biggest games, are Xbox-exclusive. Watch them do the same with CoD or most of the ActiBlizz's IPs even if it shoots them in the foot and goes completely against their message of "consumer-friendliness"

[KHCast]

8 minutes ago, Bobnik said:

Oh, also people that think they'll honor their word of "not all games gonna be Xbox-exclusive" - get off the copium, they said the exact same thing about Bethesda and yet both Starfield and Elder Scrolls 6, 2 of the biggest games, are Xbox-exclusive.

Yeah stuff like that, is why I can never get why people like Phil and his shit eating grin. Like when he went on about how going back on their word about those titles, “wasn’t to punish players of other systems”

 

And im not under any obligation to think “oh but it’s different this time with Activision”

[KingMario05]

4 hours ago, Harkofthewaa said:

At what point do the anti trust sits come in because I feel like this is pretty close.

Unless Xbox makes a play for Sony, it won't. If the FTC cleared Disney-Fox, this shit's sailing through.

As for me... well, congratulations on selling me a PS5, Microsoft. I wanted to stick with you, but thanks for proving me wrong and using my support of Xbox to help monopolize the industry! Really fucking cool, Phil. REALLY fuckin' cool.

Spoiler

Now if only I could actually buy a goddamn PS5 in stores. Come on, Sony, this can't be that hard...

 

[SonicBlastAwesome]

I'm really hope Sega will be acquiring by Nintendo or Sony. My bet is Nintendo.

[KHCast]

 

Not sure how to feel about this

[Johnny Boy]

1 hour ago, SonicBlastAwesome said:

I'm really hope Sega will be acquiring by Nintendo or Sony. My bet is Nintendo.

How about no? If Nintendo gets Sega then you can kiss Sonic fan games goodbye.

[KHCast]

1 hour ago, SonicBlastAwesome said:

I'm really hope Sega will be acquiring by Nintendo or Sony. My bet is Nintendo.

Let’s maybe not hope for and get hyped over corporate buyouts? 

[Mars]

This is going to sound like a dumb question, but I need to know because out of the new-gen systems, all I have is a Switch. Will Microsoft continue making Spyro/Crash games for Nintendo consoles in the future? Please answer because if not, i'm going to have to buy me a XB:SX or a PS5. 

[KHCast]

2 hours ago, Neon Pink said:

This is going to sound like a dumb question, but I need to know because out of the new-gen systems, all I have is a Switch. Will Microsoft continue making Spyro/Crash games for Nintendo consoles in the future? Please answer because if not, i'm going to have to buy me a XB:SX or a PS5. 

How are we supposed to know that when this was just announced, and no real details have been made? The current answer is a big old idk

[Tornado]

7 hours ago, Bobnik said:

Oh, also people that think they'll honor their word of "not all games gonna be Xbox-exclusive" - get off the copium,

I'm quite a bit less convinced than you are that Microsoft will walk away from hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue every year when they don't actually have to to make Xbox have a significant competitive advantage with the franchise anyway.

 

 

If that's "copium" then so be it. 

7 hours ago, Bobnik said:

they said the exact same thing about Bethesda

No, they didn't; but regardless of that Elder Scrolls (a PC-first franchise from one of the historically PC-first developers united under the historically PC-first publisher that Microsoft purchased) Playstation sales were always the minority compared to Xbox and PC. Get back to me when they also make Doom exclusive. 

 

 

Call of Duty games,in comparison, usually sell on Playstation vs Xbox by at least 2:1.

 

3 hours ago, Neon Pink said:

This is going to sound like a dumb question, but I need to know because out of the new-gen systems, all I have is a Switch. Will Microsoft continue making Spyro/Crash games for Nintendo consoles in the future? Please answer because if not, i'm going to have to buy me a XB:SX or a PS5. 

It was probably a reasonable assumption to make that there was never going to be another Spyro/Crash game to begin with on any platform before Microsoft announced this buyout, so it's impossible to guess what the situation will be for those franchises afterward. 

[Ryannumber1gamer]

12 minutes ago, Tornado said:

I'm quite a bit less convinced than you are that Microsoft will walk away from hundreds of millions of dollars of revenue every year when they don't actually have to to make Xbox have a significant competitive advantage with the franchise anyway.

If that's "copium" then so be it.  

Adding to this is the clear genre difference. Elder Scrolls and Bethesda's games for the most part are all heavily single-player focused titles that are based around campaigns and a heaping of single player content, which let's face it - is what Microsoft is sorely lacking right now. It makes sense to keep that as a huge exclusive that's only playable on their platforms, to compete with Sony and Nintendo's usual hosting of single player exclusives. They draw you to the console and you shell out the cash once either for the game, or for Game Pass to play it.

Multiplayer on the other hand is a far different subject. The game plan with games like Overwatch and Call of Duty is a GaaS platform where the game releases and is supported via content drops and continual player return. You need those games populated with players and servers in order to pull that off, and while Halo and COD would be able to pull the job off, games like Overwatch definitely could not, especially given that it was really particularly dying in terms of player numbers until Cross-Play was added last year.

For multiplayer titles where the focus is keeping players attached, and keeping them invested in the ecosystem, cutting both PlayStation and Nintendo would be an extraordinarily idiotic move, not only for the lost revenue from two separate platforms, but you reduce the ecosystem and playerbase of a game so heavily out of the gate, you're going to have a way harder time keeping the remaining exclusive players sticking around with increased queue times. Especially when games like Warzone are still racking in the big bucks by being the multiplatform F2P title, it's just be plain insanity to kill off a continual paying service like that.

[KHCast]

I guess that is something worth considering. Especially when CoD has championed cross platform play with their online games for awhile now. Game devs being stupid is never out of the question, but CoD is certainly one of those franchises that would be a massive kick in their wallets if they decided to exclude everyone not on Xbox/PC. Then again, there seems to be a lot of heated discourse regarding this, with many feeling it’s for sure going to go exclusive 

 

 

 

[Wraith]

I'm mixed on COD going exclusive. Stuff like Warzone benefits too much from the large community to go away completely, but even something like the main games launching first on Xbox would be enough to throw off the rhythm of the industry pretty significantly. PlayStation has had an ongoing marketing deal with Activision for COD for almost a decade now and that surely was a sales driver. Chipping away at Playstation with exclusivity deals until their ecosystem IS big enough to make some COD games exclusive is something I can see happening, I guess?

Overwatch is in an interesting situation. They headlined it in the announcement but imo the ip isn't worth NEARLY as much as it once was and it remains to be seen if Overwatch 2 will even be a hit. With COD, DOOM and Halo headlining gamepass will they even need another shooting franchise, or is it just sucking up air? OW2 will be out before this merger is a done deal in 2023, but there's already a good chance Blizzard downsizes as a result of this whole thing. Will they be able to maintain it long-term, or will they focus on something that's more uniquely "Blizzard" than a team shooter to diversify Gamepass's portfollio? Of all the 'active' IPs I think this is the one most at risk, but I guess I never have any faith in Overwatch anyway so I'm kinda biased here.

RE: Crash and Spyro, they don't even have a seat at this table. I guess Phil talked about wanting more content aimed at kids so they might dig their corpses out the back for one last rodeo but I don't expect it to happen any time soon.  These types of mergers usually lead to more safe bets/less risk, and the entire reason Crash and Spyro got shuttered in the first place was because they weren't quite as safe of a risk as more COD. Now that they're competing with Master Chief and Minecraft for attention they're even less of a priority.

Also Re: Sony's response to this. The answer is basically that they can't do anything. They don't have Microsoft money to throw around for a major purchase. They'll probably make some more exclusivity deals but no one is dumb enough to commit to those long term now so everything trickles down to the other platforms eventually. I...don't see them reacting to this in any significant way at all just because they can't. They don't have the means.

I think the next few years are going to be interesting for them since they basically handed Nintendo the entire Japanese market and Xbox just stuck a claim on like....half of the big American gaming IPs with this move. What do they have to fight all of this with besides their existing install-base? I don't even mind the idea of switching teams at this point and I've had a Playstation all my life. Casual players have to be more easily swayed than me, right?

[Kazhnuz]

9 hours ago, SonicBlastAwesome said:

I'm really hope Sega will be acquiring by Nintendo or Sony. My bet is Nintendo.

Neither will be good, in that it would continue the movement of "a small group of companies own everything".

 

But TBH, with how lucky we are, SEGA might be aquired by Amazon, lol.

[KHCast]

5 minutes ago, Wraith said:

Also Re: Sony's response to this. The answer is basically that they can't do anything. They don't have Microsoft money to throw around for a major purchase. They'll probably make some more exclusivity deals but no one is dumb enough to commit to those long term now so everything trickles down to the other platforms eventually. I...don't see them reacting to this in any significant way at all just because they can't. They don't have the means.

Isn’t Square Enix  financially struggling or something atm? Tbh of all the companies, they seem like the one prime for Sony acquisition if I were a betting man, especially since square don’t seem all that enthusiastic regarding Microsoft. Either them or Capcom I could see going full Sony, but tbh would either of those even hold a candle to Activision? 

[Kuzu]

Are Playstation much less popular in Japan nowadays? It doesn't seem that way.

Yea, it's pretty weird to see where this goes.

 

 

 

Edit: Well goddamn.

 

[Empire88]

1 hour ago, Kuzu said:

Are Playstation much less popular in Japan nowadays? It doesn't seem that way.

Yea, it's pretty weird to see where this goes.

Compared to say the PS2 era it is less popular. But generally speaking Playstation is still popular in Japan. The Switch has as lot of the Japanese market but there is still a sizeable amount of Playstation gamers. It isn't dead like people make it sound. 

As for the topic itself, yeah I am disgusted with Microsoft. They are taking a lazy route to the top. They haven't been able to compete with Playstation with developing strong IPs in the last few years so they are using money to buy out existing ones and buying out the market. The issue too is that this creates a precedent for other companies. A company should not be able to buy up all the biggest names in the industry to prevent competition. I don't care what company it is.

The other thing is we have to see the response from Sony even if it is just in change of marketing or finding more ways to attract players. Just as Nintendo tries to see themselves not competing with Sony/Xbox, Sony may try to market themselves more as the console for "a solid one player, story driven games" or something like that. Or maybe they offer more along the lines of a gamepass (which was supposedly in the works). Similarly I won't be surprised if they start developing their own FPS game right now to have something. It will be interesting watching for sure.

[azoo]

I find Microsoft’s moves here very not-good for the industry and it’s gonna lead to some nasty one sided problems as a whole, but I’m not gonna sit here and act like they’re villains in comparison and Sony would’ve never done the same if they were making the same profits. All these corporations would. They’re evil, man.

Besides, Sony’s not been the best lately, either. Seeing their fantastic Japan Studios be murdered in cold blood while they stretch their big three western studios thin (Naughty Dog, Insomniac, Santa Monica Studios), the extremely late bloom to backwards compatibility or a gamepass-alternative (partially tied into the CEO’s lack of interest in their back catalog OR the act of game preservation), their lack of desire to play along much with crossplay on other hardware let alone PC, decided to listen to and dial into their western audience and creatives over their Japanese, relying harder and harder on the dependency of Disney (Marvel)’s presence to be their breadwinner.. all of it is small decisions that show Sony was losing grip on being a compelling force in the industry; something about to be bested. In other words, a huge competitive force from Japan losing its captive audience, once a giant, possibly soon a ghost if they don’t watch out.

Sound familiar? It should. There’s another company from Japan that had an ego problem, eastern vs western dev struggle, made questionable decisions, refused to get with the times until it was too late, and went from top of the world to a fading blip. Their greatest works are still heralded to this day, and their passing lamented, even if somewhat deserving it. Some may even notice they frequent a forum about their mascot. And it was only twenty years ago. Blink and you’ll miss it!

That’s not to say it’s over for Sony, though. They’ll probably try to buy Square Enix, Kojipro, Capcom etc in a hurry, and attempt to sweet talk with EA into exclusivity despite not having the money for a purchase. It probably won’t work, either, considering Microsoft could maybe just buy EA too (and knowing how far they’re willing to go, they might). They might try to restructure their studios since I’m sure they’re now kicking themselves in the dick over gutting Japan Studios, since they were the main place most of their games came from. Maybe relying on the west’s AAA movie game experience was a bad idea to lean exclusively on, yeah?

We’ll see what happens.

[KHCast]

 

Aaaand of course gamers are getting mad at the employees for being upset with Microsoft giving Kotick a soft exit, something mind you, is not legally required from them. They could certainly make this a hell for Kotick all the way to him getting his Golden parachute. They could file a lawsuit against him directly for all his abusive bullshit and damage he’s done to Microsoft’s soon to be company. Hell, simply blacklisting the man so he can’t just get another job as a ceo in the industry, is something. Especially considering the game industry has had no problem blacklisting 100’s of employees whenever they speak out against its bullshit, ruining their chances at making a name in the games community, so applying this to a corrupt abusive ceo, shouldn’t be a moral dilemma for them 

[Jango]

14 hours ago, Wraith said:

RE: Crash and Spyro, they don't even have a seat at this table. I guess Phil talked about wanting more content aimed at kids so they might dig their corpses out the back for one last rodeo but I don't expect it to happen any time soon. 

Actually, it's well-known in the community that Toys for Bob had another Crash game (presumably a party game like Crash Bash) planned for 2021, but it's seems like it was delayed to who knows when. There were teases last year, just like Crash 4 and CTR, but nothing got announced yet. I wonder IF this game actually releases it will be exclusive to Xbox since it hasn't been announced to any platforms. 

Also, Spyro 4 got a teaser in the Crash 4 artbook aswell and "inside info" that it is in development. 

Only time will tell.