Microsoft's acquisition of Activison Blizzard

Killer_Sakoman

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21 Jun 2022
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You underestimate their delusion, now it's all about revenge fantasy against Sony using that $70B. Every game is going to be exclusive to Xbox, MS will buy FromSoftware/SE/Sega/Capcom, they'll pay for CoD exclusivity and so on.

There are also the revenge fantasies against the UK that are even more weird.
They will make king Charles an xbot. I can't wait reading all his tweets
 
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VillaiN

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10 Feb 2023
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Maybe im wrong but i think Bethesda for 8 billion before AB and management talking how they re just starting with aquisitons did them no favors. Stupidity all around.

Like how can any1 with working braincells (let alome cma) ignore we re talking about 2 trilliom company spending like there s no tomorow.

And making threats to G7 country. Glad th3y showed true face. Now they wont be able to buy even medium sized publisher.
 
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Swift_Star

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2 Jul 2022
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Maybe im wrong but i think Bethesda for 8 billion before AB and management talking how they re just starting with aquisitons did them no favors. Stupidity all around.

Like how can any1 with working braincells (let alome cma) ignore we re talking about 2 trilliom company spending like there s no tomorow.

And making threats to G7 country. Glad th3y showed true face. Now they wont be able to buy even medium sized publisher.
Nah, if they went for someone of Bethesda size, the deal would’ve passed. This ABK deal was the big tech spin of the Icarus mith. Not only it would be the biggest acquisition in gaming but in the history of capitalism. They got too greedy, flew too close to the sun, and got burned.
 

thicc_girls_are_teh_best

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HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA GET FUCKED MICROSOFT


So it turns out Microsoft PLANNED to make CoD exclusive until regulators started investigations hence why they are dropping them 10 year deals.


WOW. So, uh, basically this deal is fucc'd, then? They can't even renegotiate until a decade from now!? ABK aren't waiting around on that, they're just gonna take the $3 billion and split, doesn't matter what Microsoft wants at this point.

Also I knew their intents with the 10-year deals would come under questioning. The deals were all performative; MS waited until regulators started investigating before doling them out, rather than being upfront about their intentions from the start. Well, they were, but the intentions weren't good ones.

And we know exactly what those initial intentions actually were. 3-year deal for Sony, the terms of which were probably as questionable as the 10-year one if not worst. No plans to bring it to Nintendo, GeForce NOW, Boosteroid, BlackNut, etc. No offer to Google Stadia, because Google was named as a direct competitor and they'd rather see Stadia die (and it did), despite that would have also gotten COD to more gamers.

Maybe Microsoft intended for some of these deals after all, but the way they both timed revealing them like trump cards in a game, and the way they showboated about them publicly like they were entertaining an audience (instead of just talking business with regulators and other companies in places of business...public statements on Twitter for deals to content you don't own yet and taking out ad space in Daily Mail ain't it) ultimately worked against them.

I guess they thought the grassroots influencers/shills/Ambassadors tactics that've been used to boost Xbox's profile in online engagement would work for the ABK deal as well. Welp, that got slapped in the face so bad they're gonna feel it for the next 10 years.
 

Nitro

Active member
10 Apr 2023
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Florian Muller hoping to influence the appeal process.



There is another UK judge with a dual antitrust/patent focus many of my readers know--and some even personally know as a former colleague (patent litigator)--Mr. Justice Richard Meade. He is the judge in charge of intellectual property, but he's also a member of the CAT bench. While it's almost inconceivable that Justice Smith would not be involved with the "ABK" (for "Activision Blizzard King") case, Justice Meade may or may not be on that panel as well.

A wider audience (including the CMA) should be made aware of his insinuations. I encourage everyone to retweet expressing concern with his behaviour.

Archived in case he deletes: https://archive.is/Ux25p | https://archive.is/P4FYh
 
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thicc_girls_are_teh_best

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I've said it before, but I'm really impressed with the way Jim Ryan and Sony conducted themselves throughout all this. They were one of the few companies that devoted time, money, and resources to fighting this acquisition tooth and nail. Sure, the console SLC was thrown out but, as we're seeing now, MS' plans were just as bad or worse than many of us suspected. Remember all the ridiculing for how Sony wouldn't come to the negotiating table or take a ten year deal? As we're seeing now, there was a lot more at stake than just getting CoD on PS.

While other companies caved and signed those deals or supported MS, Sony took all the flak from the media and were professional about not lowering themselves to MS' level. It would seem that Sony very much understands what consolidation will mean not only for their business, but also for this hobby we all love. And I'm thankful for that.

I generally agree very much about Sony's professionalism throughout this, and not taking the reality TV, tabloid-fueled approach that Microsoft and their supporters have increasingly done since late last year. And as you've said, just bearing the brunt of mostly unfair criticism and attacks against them when it turns out they were right on the money about resisting the acquisition. They probably saw it as, if MS get ABK, they'll go after other publishers (and Satya Nadella in fact said they "weren't done" shortly after announcing the ABK deal. That aged well, didn't it?) and that constrains our working relationship with 3P partners if our direct competitor is in control of the contracts, the cash flow, the talent, the IP, the infrastructure, the distribution of that content.

BUT I don't think any of that means Sony haven't considered a publisher acquisition or two of their own. They might still be considering one and, at the end of the day, whoever gets one, that's still consolidation. However I think it's safe to say, we have historical evidence of Sony handling their gaming acquisitions MUCH better than Microsoft have theirs, in terms of both working with those companies prior to acquisition and then growing them to reach even higher once they've been acquired.

So on principal of what an acquisition the size of ABK could mean for further industry consolidation, I would still be against it on said grounds. However, I'd at least of been a lot more hopeful of actual studio cultural changes and increased creative output & polish if Sony were the ones making that acquisition, just going off past precedent. But that would only be a small consolation in what would still be a troubling, large-scale gaming acquisition resulting in a notable consolidation (and shrinkage of the 3P market).

Can't rule out Sony attempting for a publisher themselves in the near future, though obviously would be much smaller than ABK, or even something like EA or Take Two. Also more likely it would be a Japanese publisher rather than an American or European one; their acquisitions on those last two fronts have been pretty much focused on independent studios, most with no IP attached to them (Bungie is the sole exception). If/when they do, though, at least we know they would handle it much better than Microsoft have handled the ABK deal, that's for sure.

Just like pro-MS people are calling them corrupt because it didn't go through.

I do remember questioning some of their reasoning in the revised PF where they dropped the console SLC, and maybe cracked a few sarcastic statements here and there, but never once questioned their process or thought they were corrupt or invalid, and never thought anything of the CAT overturning it or having the UK government step in.

Just accepted that the console SLC was dropped, and likely that the deal stood a better chance of being passed, which did concern me because of what precedent it may've set for future consolidation if MS's 10-year deals were somehow enough. And somehow that letting the deal past even though behavioral remedies were mentioned as not being sufficient for a case like ABK due to difficulty in enforcing the remedies (and it not being the regulator's job to "babysit" decisions for long-term after a decision was made).

Although I also admit I had forgotten about cloud concerns to a large extent by that point, and hadn't thought about the mobile implications (and potential concerns, of which MS offered nothing to, not even proactively just to get ahead of it as a potential stress point) either.

Apparently MS forgot about the actual cloud concerns, too.
 

ksdixon

Dixon Cider Ltd.
22 Jun 2022
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Xbots are unhinged... I had a friend who was in the know about some things years early, but it was hard talking games, cause then he'd always go a step further.

Suddenly SE saying they were happy with Outriders performance on GP automatically meant SE were pissed at Sony for whatever reason and were going to be bought by Xbox. It was always a guess if he was trying to work you, or be straight with you. Bit of a boy who cried wolf.

My response to that one at the time was, ok, why can't you play FF7R yet then? You might know some things early, but you cant BS about things I'm up-to-date with on daily message boards, SE are cozzying-up to Sony etc.
 
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Freeza93

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1 May 2023
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i hope you guys will enjoy another year of news of this dumpsterfire where sony and microsoft are behaving like 5 years olds. this will go on til 2024 now.

microsoft only wants the mobile games from activison they make much more money then all consoles game together. ms doesnt care about sony. they play the long game. for that sweet sweet candy crush and mobile userbase of hundred of millions. console gaming is fucking tiny in comparison
 

Dabaus

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28 Jun 2022
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i hope you guys will enjoy another year of news of this dumpsterfire where sony and microsoft are behaving like 5 years olds. this will go on til 2024 now.

microsoft only wants the mobile games from activison they make much more money then all consoles game together. ms doesnt care about sony. they play the long game. for that sweet sweet candy crush and mobile userbase of hundred of millions. console gaming is fucking tiny in comparison
Is this a new copy/pasta?
 

Edmund

Active member
25 Apr 2023
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i hope you guys will enjoy another year of news of this dumpsterfire where sony and microsoft are behaving like 5 years olds. this will go on til 2024 now.

microsoft only wants the mobile games from activison they make much more money then all consoles game together. ms doesnt care about sony. they play the long game. for that sweet sweet candy crush and mobile userbase of hundred of millions. console gaming is fucking tiny in comparison

The only ones behaving like 5 year olds are Microsoft and Activision Blizzard.