FTC blocking this deal made this story much more interesting and spicy lol
Microsoft's acquisition of Activison Blizzard
- Thread starter Darth Vader
- Start date
Especially considering that out of all official comissions, the FTC is the one people expected to block the deal the least.
I didn't really expect this either, we've seen so many crazy deals go thru I thought this would just be yet another wild deal.
Maybe MS got a bit too greedy and overzealous with those buyouts or something and FTC used that Bethesda example of what they expected MS to do with Activision.
Ppl have come to expect major corporations especially big tech can always have its own way so it would always be a self-fulfilling prophecy that these deals could always go through without issues. Finally glad to see some push back. Even if it does go through in the end I want the ftc to drag this shit out. Fck Microsoft.
Excellent point about Netflix. I agree about Game Pass too and, beyond that, so much of this has to do with taking away choice from gamers. One way or another, they're going to try to drag you into their ecosystem. Not by creating an ecosystem worth investing in, but by removing your options (eg. buying and making IPs exclusive) until you do. They tried making it a value proposition - $1 deals, the proposed doubling of Gold price - and now they're falling back on the methods they've used in other sectors. I am glad to see the FTC push back on this and hope other regulatory bodies follow suit.
Two points:
1. Don’t be too lazy to type “people”
2. You can say “fuck” on here.
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Literally nothing could make me do it. I’d rather have my hands cutoff and fed to me. Deep fried ofc. Maybe I would regret it after I had to eat the first hand but initially I’d be pretty firm in my decision.
Same.
I had a thought this morning.
For anyone who doesn't understand why Xbox continually fails in spite of how MS is overall successful, consider this:
Everything that made Microsoft a juggernaut in OS and business software, criminal anticompetitive conduct and unethical company culture aside, is antithetical to success in creative industries.
Their studios fail because MS' product management strategies over-emphasize focus marketing. They try to merely iterate on what hits, leading to the Halo-Gears-Forza cycle, with diminishing results. Arguably, Forza and Horizon are only still doing well because, shit, how hard is it to crank out new releases for a racing series when you driving model is locked in and you contract out all your car models and track maps to outside companies?
They hire contractors to make games, then change what games they are making are supposed to be, don't loop them in to any plans for marketing or scheduling, cut budgets in mid-stream based on market projections and generally make the incubation process that creative endeavours go through almost completely impossible, because the people up the chain that the studios report to only understand concrete landmarks and don't know or care that sometimes you can get to 50% done and realize you need to put the brakes on to make things come together. The Phantom Dust remake fiasco illustrates most of this.
Meanwhile, their internal studios are allowed to get in the weeds to the point of spending the better part of a decade with nothing to show for their work, because the teams just need to have some concept art and vertical slices to keep funding rolling in. Lionhead was notorious for this, thanks to Peter Molyneux being just the right kind of conman to sucker in the executives with totally fake demos and big promises. Rare is also in a similarly rudderless mode, due to the founding talents of the studio having departed long ago, and the current staff having no leadership to guide them.
The key ingredient that keeps Xbox failing on a creative level is summed up well in a legendary Steve Jobs quote about MS. "They just don't have any taste". Once the fad of the over-aggro style exemplified by Gears of War (Which was not an internal product, but one of the bigger money hats in games history) had passed, MS' philosophy kept them cranking out more of the same to diminishing interest, quality and sales, yet they keep making more Gears as if it was still 2008. They don't have anyone there who can actually create something that connects outside of their fanboys.
Remember folks, Halo and Gears were outside products MS bought, they weren't in-house. MS bought Bungie and treated them so poorly from a creative freedom standpoint that they bought their freedom back after being handcuffed to Halo and not being allowed to do anything new. Gears started as a multiplat until Cliffy B threw a fit about having to learn how to code efficiently and conned MS into changing their memory configuration to suit him, then MS bought exclusivity for the series, and when Epic decided to move on due to diminishing returns, MS bought the IP lock, stock and barrel, and took one of their internal teams that had an impressive talent roster, and turned them into a Gears factory, leading to most of the key creative staff leaving the studio.
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It looks like MS have decided to treat this latest obstacle with the FTC in the only way they know how:
www.gamespot.com
Blame someone else.
Sony Wants To Grow PlayStation By Making Xbox Smaller, Phil Spencer Says
"There has really only been one major opposer to the deal, and it's Sony."
www.gamespot.com
Blame someone else.
Somehow, I don't think the FTC minds the idea of smaller Microsoft, and gaming would be in a much better place if MS was made smaller by the Xbox division going away for good. Almost everything in modern gaming that people whine about all the time came from MS themselves or developers who got into consoles because of MS allowing them to port DirectX code with little effort, and from MS nickel and dime-ing their customers and allowing others to do so at every opportunity.It looks like MS have decided to treat this latest obstacle with the FTC in the only way they know how:
Sony Wants To Grow PlayStation By Making Xbox Smaller, Phil Spencer Says
"There has really only been one major opposer to the deal, and it's Sony."
Blame someone else.
When I read the article, I remembered your thoughtful analysis on why MS keeps failing in the game business. The struggles they're having with the acquisition and gaining market share could be an opportunity for reflection on why they keep placing third, but there is not even a hint of that happening. It's Sony's fault they're where they're at. That's all Phil could relay about the current situation. This comes when even their own fans are starting to question the lack of games and output of all their studios.
On another note, with this kind of PR bs, I suspect the deal may truly be in trouble. It goes with the standard MO of shifting responsibility to someone else for their own failures.
Funny thing, the more of this kind of press you see, the less likely the deal passing becomes. It all gets filed and presented to the judge in one way or the other, and if there is one thing judges have zero patience for, it is when one side of a suit tries to manipulate public opinion this transparently. The court of public opinion doesn't count for anything, but MS wants their excuses pre-baked for the investors.
There is a LONG record of MS trying to damage PlayStation through fair means and foul over the years, and IBM even had to pay a settlement for giving Cell trade secrets to MS for the 360 processor. MS has tried buying exclusives, buying developers, buying publishers, bribing the gaming media directly and indirectly through promises of jobs in the future, pushing retailers to cut Sony self space, flooding the channels at retail to pump their sales numbers, as MS only reports sell-in, not sell-through (Example: I managed a Blockbuster location. One of the slowest in my city, and we had 18 Xbox 360 consoles in our lockup, including a few Halo 3 limited editions. In 2009! I asked my regional manager why they kept sending me more, and he said "MS keeps sending them, and we have no room in the warehouse, so find room for them") and marketing spending in excess of the division's lifetime revenues propped up by their OS and Office monopoly. It isn't like they ever tried to compete on their own merits, they just decided to violate the consent decree they were placed under in 2000 and pay the fines they incurred and try to buy gaming like they bought everything else.
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It's been an awful week for Microsoft lol.It looks like MS have decided to treat this latest obstacle with the FTC in the only way they know how:
Sony Wants To Grow PlayStation By Making Xbox Smaller, Phil Spencer Says
"There has really only been one major opposer to the deal, and it's Sony."
Blame someone else.
I feel like the more they talk (Phil, MS in general, their people on Twitter, etc.) the worse it's going to get. If there ever was a time to STFU and get on with it, it's now.
You love to see it!
I never wanted that cancer in the console industry, and I am happy to see the failures finally stacking up to the point where they may just throw in the towel if this buyout attempt fails.
Interesting trivia, but in an interview Sheamus Blackley gave about the original Xbox days, he told a story that it was the sales of Age of Empires on PlayStation, which was a Japan-exclusive published by Konami under license, that drove Bill Gates to decide to run Sony out of gaming. He figured that their game selling so well on someone else's machine meant that the holder of the platform was a threat to MS, rather than an opportunity to expand their software's reach. He also refused to allow Konami to bring it out in the west.
Phil: "Sony wants to make xbox smaller"
Also Phil: "Xbox series is the fastest selling xbox console ever"
Literally cannot keep his story straight. Dude is floundering
Also Phil: "Xbox series is the fastest selling xbox console ever"
Literally cannot keep his story straight. Dude is floundering
They should have shut the fuck up before Phil's idiotic statement about not stopping with Activision. He said the quiet part out loud and his head is in the guillotine if this falls apart.
One gets the feeling he has already been told he is out the door if the deal fails, as it had to be his idea in the first place.
A thought occurred to me, Microsoft claims that putting games on Gamepass would mean being available more places, so where is the MacOS client for it? Oh, right, they just want every game possible to be trapped in the Windows ecosystem, which Xbox is a part of. More choices for gamers, as long as they make the choice to use only the platforms WE own!
And, before anyone asks, yes, I am pissed off that Sony doesn't have a PlayStation Plus client for Mac, since they do have the Remote Play client as native Mac software, and there used to be a Mac client for PSNow years ago.
Starfield was their biggest victory but it came back to bite them in the ass with the CMA and now with FTC. They will lose everything because of that move. Justice.
The xbots are now going against the FTC and their definition of the big 4 AAA Publishers because of ...Tencent and Embracer???
They don't even release any big AAA on consoles?