The problem here is that this acquisition just opens the door. When this goes through, it gives a green light to everyone, including MS, to go for more.
This decision will shape the industry. And when it goes through, nothing's stopping MS from buying out the industry. Not a single thing.
If regulators look at one of the biggest companies in the world, buying one of the biggest companies in gaming for the amount that's more than half of the market cap of their biggest competitor, and shrugging it of, no other acquisition is getting stopped.
The CMA is all bark and is just putting on a show. They're approving this with no remedies in place. They went back on their decision based on some pretty shady data provided by MS. Sony called them out but it's not changing anything.
I actually think this deal will hamstrung Microsoft for future big publisher acquisitions. Keep in mind, they've been using the "we're in last place!" rhetoric a LOT for getting this ABK deal through. If/when it's approved, they will, almost immediately, leapfrog Nintendo clearly in gaming revenue, and be within spitting distance of Sony. Hell, they could edge them out in gaming revenue if ABK has a particularly strong year (because we know Xbox itself via XGS won't).
That won't go unnoticed, and if somehow Xbox revenue (after adding ABK's to it) starts cratering, that is also going to be noticed, for all the wrong reasons. Because it would signal Microsoft directly contributing to a shrinking or harm of revenue to the gaming market as if they hadn't purchased ABK, ABK revenue would not have decreased, meaning theoretically, gaming revenue as a whole would not have dropped.
So in a way, I'm actually hoping the ABK deal is approved now, because it will pretty much lock Microsoft out from making other major publisher acquisitions for a long, long time. They do well and now Xbox revenue is steamrolling Nintendo and within spitting distance of PlayStation (if not edging even them out). They do poorly with dropping Xbox revenue and now they have to accept the reality they've just harmed the market by taking an independent 3P publisher, acquiring them, and somehow seeing Xbox revenue drop even after combining the revenue streams. Which at the very least, would now hamstring ABK to a division seeing further drops in revenue when it shouldn't be seeing such drops.
Unfortunately, there is still the precedent the deal would set for other Big Tech companies to make their own acquisitions, if it were approved (particularly without structural remedies or VERY strict behavioral remedies, or both), and they would not be "locked" the way Microsoft will, so the threat of mass industry consolidation could still be carried through by them, and we know some of those Big Tech companies would want to make acquired content exclusive to bolster their own gaming products and services. So that is a reason why I would still resist wanting to see the ABK deal approved.
They can easily make it not worth the effort to MS by just showing up to negotiate and by buying stakes in them beforehand. Buying any Japanese publisher is a huge challenge for MS because they just don't have the audience that play those games.
Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, Resident Evil, Monster Hunter, Eden Ring, Yakuza, Persona, Sony need all the upcoming entries of those games tied to PlayStation with marketing or exclusivity deals.
Look at how much Sony having contracts with Bethesda changed the impact of that acquisition, Ghostwire Tokyo and Dethloop would've been huge for Xbox in a period where they had nothing going on and to this day Bethesda games keep being added to PS+. Same thing happened with Activision, Sony having CoD under contract buy them a lot of time and PS+ has had Activision titles for a long time so that decreases the appeal of their legacy catalog.
Yeah, at the very least Sony NEED to buy some good amount of shares in the big Japanese 3P publishers. That should be a minimum requirement, and they've done well so far with Kadokawa (and From Software). They need to repeat that strategy with Capcom, Square-Enix, Koei-Tecmo, Bandai-Namco, Konami, Sega etc.
And I would say, do similar for key Western 3P publishers like Take-Two and EA. That would be a good compromise for a while if they don't want to rush into acquisitions.
Given the CMA rumors, it makes sense why MS and their shills have moved on to attacking the FTC. They're the only remaining body that still dares to resist them.
It's actually pretty disgusting how much the zealots are attacking / harassing her on behalf of their favorite piece of plastic.
I'm waiting for Xbox 007 to make a racist post anytime now against her just because the FTC are putting up some actual resistance to the deal.
