A restructuring isn't an acquisition.
True, I don't know why do you mention restructuring when has nothing to do with this. As I said SCE acquired Red Zone in 2001, here you have
the related press release.
The MLB series predates Redzone being acquired. Look it up.
I know, and Red Zone worked on multiple games for them before being acquired by Sony in 2001.
Sure, Jan.
When two companies form a new company, that is in fact a merger. Square Enix, Namco Bandai, Sega Sammy, Koei Tecmo... all mergers...
Yes, these were merges. These weren't acquisitions, which is when a bigger company takes ownership of a smaller one, the typical case seen when an industry is in a consolitation stage. As happening now in gaming with Tencent, Sony, Netease, MS, Epic, EA, Take 2, Embracer, etc. aquiring smaller companies.
Pure acquisitions are slowing down because the value of game companies is largely overstated. That's why we're seeing layoffs across the board, because these companies are not profitable enough and game development continues to increase in cost.
Who are the big players you're referring to here that are going to swoop in and buy major publishers? Go on the record.
Acquisitions aren't slowing down because companies are overvalued, there are other reasons. Big players like Sony, Tencent, MS, Embracer took a break from acquisitions for different reasons they mentioned, none of them being that potential targets are overvalued.
They made many acquisitions and investments in recent years, and recently decided to temporally pause them while reorganizing and integrating previous ones, plus paying their related costs and starting to recoup a portion of their investment. And in some cases mentioning they wanted to wait due to different macroeconomical reasons such as post covid big inflation, economical uncertainity (now even more seeing that gaming market didn't recover after covid as fast as everybody estimated), geopolitical tensions, etc.
Companies like Sony or MS mentioned they'll continue with acquisitions after a pause. In case of Tencent they slowed down investments and acquisitions last year but didn't stop them. Embracer got fucked with a big investment they were counting with but ultimately failed and as consequence had to massively cut fat and reorganize itself.
None of them said if their future acquisitions will be large or small, because obviously it would be retarded because it would affect the market and valuations and could difficult the acquisitions. Obviously, the only ones who could afford to acquire big publishers the biggest publishers/platform holders, some of them being relatively external actors who maybe could want to enter in gaming having a more direct role in gaming (Amazon, Disney, Google, Apple, Meta and not just Tencent, Netease, Sony, MS, Valve or Epic). The thing is, as of now most of the big gaming publishers don't want to sell, because it would be stupid since they are growing.
I think in the next 10 years we'll see several of these ones being acquired or part of a merge: EA, Take 2, Epic, Valve, Embracer, Koei Tecmo, Sega Sammy, Kadokawa, CD Projekt, Paradox Interactive, Devolver, Team 17, Annapurna. But I also think we'll see several big mobile gaming companies being acquired for a large amount of money.
Regarding layoffs, they are totally unrelated to company valuations, if companies fire hundreds or thousands of people isn't because their company valuation is higher or lower.
So who is going to buy these companies and when?
I don't have a crystall ball. We know MS tried it and failed with some of them, and that others publicly said they don't want to sell.
Microsoft bought Zenimax and immediately looked to foreclose.
What do you mean by foreclose? When they were acquired, the Xbox CFO said that their plans were "What we'll do in the long run is we don't have intentions of just pulling all of Bethesda content out of Sony or Nintendo or otherwise. But what we want is we want that content, in the long run, to be either first or better or best or pick your differentiated experience, on our platforms".
Meaning, they intended to keep them multi but with some timed exclusive.
Outside of Bungie, Sony has never bought a company to allow them to be multiplatform. You're basing everything on ABK and Bungie, which are more the exception than the rule.
No, I'm also mentioning Mojang and Zenimax too. Because like ABK and Bungie, as their acquirers said, they part of the multiplatform strategy of their acquirers.
In case of Sony, other parts of their multiplatform strategy are the PC ports, other new GaaS being day one on PC and investments and deals they are making for their future growth on mobile.
The PC handheld market is niche, especially compared to the Switch... nothing tracks in what you're saying. It's like you're just saying things to say them.
Regarding game sales the PC handheld market doesn't exist. It's the PC market, which is way bigger than the Switch one.
Why would Sony make a PC handheld? And no, no one is going to make a PC handheld as powerful as the Switch 2 and priced the same.
Clearly you don't understand how cost of components work and the profit margin for selling a console without getting the same margin on software sales.
PS Player apparently had better sales than Sony estimated, and it has cloud gaming support apparently in the works. So pretty likely, will do a PS Player successor in the next gen for PS6, in the same way they were happy with PSVR1 and made PSVR2.
The main goal of PS Player wasn't to sell games. But instead, to increase playtime and engagement for PS5.
Its most requested feature is to feature native games. But they saw that Vita and Switch don't get enough 3rd party sales and support because sales are too low for the budgets required, and same would happen 1st party support. Didn't make sense for Sony to spend a lot on it for Vita or VR because sales are too low.
PC handhelds instead don't need dedicated games or ports because they run the PC ones. Sony is apparently working on their own PC store. So turning the "PS Player 2" into a Sony PC handheld would increase both the sales of the device and the sales on their PC store, while getting rid of the issues related to having to support with 1st and 3rd party titles a portable console.
Regarding PC handhelds horsepower compared to Switch 2, I expect all the future ones, including potential ones from Sony and MS, to be of course more powerful than Switch 2. Regarding princing, for that reason I expect most of them being more expensive than Switch 2. But I think there can be exceptions from the key platform holders as could be MS, Valve or Sony (or who knows if some day other one as could be Amazon or Tencent), who could follow a strategy similar to what companies normally do in console: to sell the hardware at a loss compensating it with profits made in their game store.
You remind me of thicc who have said something and you just roll with it. Sony's handheld will not be a PC, even if they had a PC store. It'll run on AMD architecture and share a design language with PS5 and/or PS6.
PS5 already has PC based hardware and PC based OS, other than its closed nature and form factor, it already essentially is a PC like Steamdeck. If Sony wants, both PS6 and this "PS Player 2" could simply use their same PC store and run there PC games, independently if they have it open to install OtherOs or other stores or not.
In the same way that PS Player, Meta Quest and Switch use smartphone/tablet tech.
Only a retarded? If you're going to insult someone, try and have some decent grammar and spelling.
Yes.
Their CARG has been awful.
I assume that behind such refined grammar and spelling you mean CAGR.
Maybe instead of being a gaming flatearther who keeps denying the reality even when the receipts are put in front of your face, you have bad memory, so I'll remind it to you: they had a great growth.
Growth in 10 years:
-Market cap: from $2.4B to $4.4B (stock value grew more than 50% in the last 5 years)
-Revenue: from $1.6B to $2.5B/year
