It's been 12 months since Microsoft purchased Activision Blizzard, so what's changed?

[akira__]

Points from the article, shamelessly copied.

-Blizzard's survival game was cancelled during January layoffs

-GamePass price increase.

-Multipele rounds of layoffs.

-Almost all ABK games still missing from gamepass.

-Toys for Bob is now an independent studio

-Arkane Austin and Tango Gameworks were shut down (the latter was aquired by Krafton)

-Sea of Thieves, Hi-Fi Rush, Grounded, and Pentiment came to PS5 (the latter 2 came to Switch as well)

-Many more Xbox games expected to be ported including Indiana Jones in early 2025

-Diablo 4 and CoD MWIII came to Gamepass

-Day one releases and 40 previous titles have been removed from Gamepass's basic tier.

It's been 12 months since Microsoft purchased Activision Blizzard, so what's changed?

It has been one year since Microsoft finally acquired Activision Blizzard for $68.7bn, making history as the biggest company buyout in the video games industry

www.eurogamer.net

 

[BillyZ]

Buying a publisher just to keep it multiplatform is already a waste of money. In this case it backfired so badly that Xbox is now entirely multiplatform.

 

[Infinity]

Buying a publisher just to keep it multiplatform is already a waste of money. In this case it backfired so badly that Xbox is now entirely multiplatform.

That was always the goal. It's not a waste of money Buying valuable ips. Buying Activision gave them a shit ton of IPS. It also netted them the golden goose of the fps genre cod.

 

[akira__]

That was always the goal. It's not a waste of money Buying valuable ips. Buying Activision gave them a shit ton of IPS. It also netted them the golden goose of the fps genre cod.

Your perspective is intriguing.
So the intended goal of the ABK deal according to you, was to bring games to playstation?

Interesting. I hadn't thought about the possibility of such a brilliant move.

 

[Bryank75]

I remember hearing how some Activision employees were excited about it and I was just shaking my head... What naive souls....

 

[Kokoloko]

As much as MS buying Bethesda and Activision sucked. It was there smartest moves

They now dont really need to worry about dying lol or their 1st party ips working out. They basically cemented themselves in the industry to stay as a publisher. Without Bethesda and Activision, MS would struggle as a just a publisher. Now they are more than fine.

They now own

-Call of Duty
-Diablo
-Fallout
-Elder Scrolls
-Doom
-Minecraft
And much more.

They might leave the platform business but they have enough ips to keep being around and successful .
Well at least for some time, they might run all of that to the ground but not atm. Thats alot of popular IPs to ruin, but if anyone can spend billions on something and destroy it, MS has that reputation. They made nothing of Rare and Halo

 

[Cool hand luke]

As much as MS buying Bethesda and Activision sucked. It was there smartest moves

They now dont really need to worry about dying lol or their 1st party ips working out. They basically cemented themselves in the industry to stay as a publisher. Without Bethesda and Activision, MS would struggle as a just a publisher. Now they are more than fine.

They now own

-Call of Duty
-Diablo
-Fallout
-Elder Scrolls
-Doom
-Minecraft
And much more.

They might leave the platform business but they have enough ips to keep being around and successful .
Well at least for some time, they might run all of that to the ground but not atm. Thats alot of popular IPs to ruin, but if anyone can spend billions on something and destroy it, MS has that reputation. They made nothing of Rare and Halo

They're technically Microsoft IPs now, but the gaming world will never consider them as such, and they sure as shit don't belong to Xbox like I've heard some rabid rats proclaim.

 

[BarrierIslandZilla]

Everything I thought would happen did not, so I would say this has been a complete waste of time.

Outside of guaranteeing that Sony has no exclusive content for black ops 6 I don’t seem to see the point. Are they even marketing COD as a Xbox IP? Their marketing team is horrendous.

 

[Kokoloko]

They're technically Microsoft IPs now, but the gaming world will never consider them as such, and they sure as shit don't belong to Xbox like I've heard some rabid rats proclaim.

Yeah they didnt earn them, but those ips will be keeping MS in the industry. More so than Halo and Gears

 

[Shadow2027]

I remember hearing how some Activision employees were excited about it and I was just shaking my head... What naive souls....

Probably the ones who didnt want to work as Bobby kept a tight ship and made sure deadlines were being hit. Under xbox, they can take 10 years to release a 6/10 game

 

[Say1nMan]

I remember hearing how some Activision employees were excited about it and I was just shaking my head... What naive souls....

They all rushed towards Phil with excitement taking pictures with him when he and Sarah Bond visited ABK headquarters after the acquisition believing that Phil was this white knight galloping in to save them from the horrors of Bobby Kotick. Lol. Boy, if only those employees had a crystal ball with them at the time. If only they knew the consequences that followed after that “meet and greet.”

 

[ethomaz]

That was always the goal. It's not a waste of money Buying valuable ips. Buying Activision gave them a shit ton of IPS. It also netted them the golden goose of the fps genre cod.

The goal of Microsoft was Xbox marketing dominance.
Not releasing games on PS5 lol

They where forced to release games on PS5 because their games on Xbox and PC where not making enough money.

And you can see that goal with all previous multi platform games on Bestelda become exclusive… now that it is become multiplaform again.

 

[Infinity]

The goal of Microsoft was Xbox marketing dominance.
Not releasing games on PS5 lol

They where forced to release games on PS5 because their games on Xbox and PC where not making enough money.

And you can see that goal with all previous multi platform games on Bestelda become exclusive… now that it is become multiplaform again.

yes at one point. But the ABK purchase was the whole point. to go multiplatform.

 

[Would_you_kindly]

Does anyone know if Sony has told Microsoft they want a 70 / 30 % split for cod back ? , I know they changed it for cod to 80 / 20 % but now they have no marketing rights or benefits I hope they told Microsoft to change it back to the standard

 

[DarkLordOtaku]

yes at one point. But the ABK purchase was the whole point. to go multiplatform.

Also to grow Gamepass subscribers. COD consumers tend to be pretty regularly engaged gamers, so they make for an attractive market for subscription services. Same for things like WoW, Candy Crush, Overwatch, etc.

 

[peter42O]

Does anyone know if Sony has told Microsoft they want a 70 / 30 % split for cod back ? , I know they changed it for cod to 80 / 20 % but now they have no marketing rights or benefits I hope they told Microsoft to change it back to the standard

The 80/20 wasn't for Sony. It was for Microsoft. This was one of the reasons why Microsoft went after ABK when they looking to sell. Sony is still 70/30.

Also to grow Gamepass subscribers. COD consumers tend to be pretty regularly engaged gamers, so they make for an attractive market for subscription services. Same for things like WoW, Candy Crush, Overwatch, etc.

Having a few big live service games attached to Game Pass is smart because if you're someone that plays them on a weekly/monthly basis, chances are you would stay subscribed.

 

[Would_you_kindly]

The 80/20 wasn't for Sony. It was for Microsoft. This was one of the reasons why Microsoft went after ABK when they looking to sell. Sony is still 70/30.



Having a few big live service games attached to Game Pass is smart because if you're someone that plays them on a weekly/monthly basis, chances are you would stay subscribed.

That's not true , both Microsoft & Sony were taking an 80/20 split for cod

 

[peter42O]

That's not true , both Microsoft & Sony were taking an 80/20 split for cod

Looking it up, it was only for Microsoft because Kotick threatened to pull COD from Xbox if Microsoft didn't accept the 80/20. I don't see anyone from Sony that said it was 80/20. It's why I found it hilarious when in the end, Microsoft said, no worries, we'll just buy you the fuck out a year later. lol

It's all from the ABK deal that had a shit ton of information given out or leaked out.

 

[Would_you_kindly]

Looking it up, it was only for Microsoft because Kotick threatened to pull COD from Xbox if Microsoft didn't accept the 80/20. I don't see anyone from Sony that said it was 80/20. It's why I found it hilarious when in the end, Microsoft said, no worries, we'll just buy you the fuck out a year later. lol

It's all from the ABK deal that had a shit ton of information given out or leaked out.

If you looked it up you'd see a thread from last year about this where multiple users corrected the false statement that Xbox was getting a lower split than playstation , they both were getting the same split only difference is Xbox leadership were crying about it in court

 

[peter42O]

If you looked it up you'd see a thread from last year about this where multiple users corrected the false statement that Xbox was getting a lower split than playstation , they both were getting the same split only difference is Xbox leadership were crying about it in court

I see the thread but did anyone from Sony confirm it because if not, im not exactly going to believe people on a forum that's favored towards Sony and PlayStation. Even more so is the fact that if it was true, why wouldn't Jim Ryan or others say so when they were on the stand testifying? Anyone from Sony would have easily countered that in court if it was true.