PlayStation poor acquisition targets & seemingly directionless as a platform/storefront holder

mibu no ookami

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Poor Sony with no money, paid almost $400m for Gaikai and $1.5B for Sony Sony Ericsson, not to mention tons of other acquisitions for their TV and Music Business... but they didn't have the money to set up PlayStation for future success with key acquisitions. :ROFLMAO:

All along they kept making the same mistake of not believing in the strength of their own gaming business and brand.

Again revisionist.

Sony entered into a joint venture with Ericsson in 2001. In 2012, they bought Ericsson's share of the joint venture. The mobile phone market was booming. This ABSOLUTELY made sense and had Sony had better management/engineering and made better decisions around this time, this purchase would have looked very different.

I think it's fair to criticize Sony and their mismanagement and poor execution, but saying buying Ericcson was a mistake reveals a lack of understanding that is hard to fathom. If Sony-Ericcson aka Sony Mobile ended up as big as Samsung in the mobile phone market, it would have been hailed as a great purchase.

You have a difficult time separating the idea and the results, which is ironic since you deal entirely in hindsight, but ignore that had Sony made certain moves the results could have been very different from what we see today.

If Sony bought FromSoftware, there is a VERY good chance that they never become what they are today. From doesn't own dark souls, so at best Dark Souls 2 would have been Demon's Souls 2 and that that game would have been exclusive to PS3 and not released on Xbox or PC. That game probably fails to garner nearly as much attention as Dark Souls did. We have seen evidence of that with Bloodborne and Demon's Souls remake.

Sony-Ericsson failed to build market share, but had they, it would have set Sony up massively. Risk-Reward.

Sony bought Gakai and they probably bought into that technology too soon, but that investment will probably set them up for the future regardless. That investment will probably still place them in a strong position in what is almost certainly the future of gaming.

But again, both of these purchases happened in 2012.

You feel like Sony should be investing more in PlayStation, but even at this time where Sony was losing money annually, the Picture and Music businesses were profitable and you ignore the internal investments Sony made putting hundreds of millions of dollars into software development leading to The Last of Us, Uncharted, God of War 2018, Horizon Zero Dawn, Spider-Man, Day's Gone, Detroit Become Human, The Last Guardian, Killzone Shadow Fall. Some of these becoming major successes.

Looking back at the decisions you WISH Sony made and when you wish they made them, the information on hand would suggest not making those decisions or being unable to make those decisions.

You also pretend like they've been spending TONS of money on acquisitions for Music and Pictures, but not games.

Sony Music bought EMI for 2.3 billion. They also bought out the rest of Sony/ATV for 750 million.
Sony Pictures bought Crunchyroll for 1.2 billion.

Sony's investments in Bungie equals any investment Sony Music or Pictures have made. Their investments in Insomniac Games, and their very budgets for their AAA titles are massive.


But the big difference between buying game studios is that personnel come and go. Sony's investments in music and pictures are largely investments in IP that have lasted decades.

When you buy a AAA studio, you are not just buying them, you're renting their personnel, buying their debt, and buying their production costs.
 

Nhomnhom

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Again revisionist.

Sony entered into a joint venture with Ericsson in 2001. In 2012, they bought Ericsson's share of the joint venture. The mobile phone market was booming. This ABSOLUTELY made sense and had Sony had better management/engineering and made better decisions around this time, this purchase would have looked very different.

I think it's fair to criticize Sony and their mismanagement and poor execution, but saying buying Ericcson was a mistake reveals a lack of understanding that is hard to fathom. If Sony-Ericcson aka Sony Mobile ended up as big as Samsung in the mobile phone market, it would have been hailed as a great purchase.

You have a difficult time separating the idea and the results, which is ironic since you deal entirely in hindsight, but ignore that had Sony made certain moves the results could have been very different from what we see today.

If Sony bought FromSoftware, there is a VERY good chance that they never become what they are today. From doesn't own dark souls, so at best Dark Souls 2 would have been Demon's Souls 2 and that that game would have been exclusive to PS3 and not released on Xbox or PC. That game probably fails to garner nearly as much attention as Dark Souls did. We have seen evidence of that with Bloodborne and Demon's Souls remake.

Sony-Ericsson failed to build market share, but had they, it would have set Sony up massively. Risk-Reward.

Sony bought Gakai and they probably bought into that technology too soon, but that investment will probably set them up for the future regardless. That investment will probably still place them in a strong position in what is almost certainly the future of gaming.

But again, both of these purchases happened in 2012.

You feel like Sony should be investing more in PlayStation, but even at this time where Sony was losing money annually, the Picture and Music businesses were profitable and you ignore the internal investments Sony made putting hundreds of millions of dollars into software development leading to The Last of Us, Uncharted, God of War 2018, Horizon Zero Dawn, Spider-Man, Day's Gone, Detroit Become Human, The Last Guardian, Killzone Shadow Fall. Some of these becoming major successes.

Looking back at the decisions you WISH Sony made and when you wish they made them, the information on hand would suggest not making those decisions or being unable to make those decisions.

You also pretend like they've been spending TONS of money on acquisitions for Music and Pictures, but not games.

Sony Music bought EMI for 2.3 billion. They also bought out the rest of Sony/ATV for 750 million.
Sony Pictures bought Crunchyroll for 1.2 billion.

Sony's investments in Bungie equals any investment Sony Music or Pictures have made. Their investments in Insomniac Games, and their very budgets for their AAA titles are massive.


But the big difference between buying game studios is that personnel come and go. Sony's investments in music and pictures are largely investments in IP that have lasted decades.

When you buy a AAA studio, you are not just buying them, you're renting their personnel, buying their debt, and buying their production costs.
Every move Sony makes is correct, you are so boring...

Bungie, what a waste... if I liked Bungie I would be an Xbox fan. Easily one of the worst studios out there, now unfortunately a part of PlayStation.

Even their most stupid moves were great moves according to you like arriving late to markets, blindly following trends, not recognizing their own strengths, etc. Sony has sucked for a long time and it's unfortunate PlayStation has been held back by them for so long.
 

mibu no ookami

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Every move Sony makes is correct, you are so boring...

Bungie, what a waste... if I liked Bungie I would be an Xbox fan. Easily one of the worst studios out there, now unfortunately a part of PlayStation.

Even their most stupid moves were great moves according to you like arriving late to markets, blindly following trends, not recognizing their own strengths, etc. Sony has sucked for a long time and it's unfortunate PlayStation has been held back by them for so long.

Again with the straw man arguments.

Who said that every move Sony makes is correct?

You're just a fanboy who makes silly arguments. Bungie was a mistake? They created two of the most popular and successful franchises in the history of gaming back to back. That's undeniable.

I think they probably overpaid for Bungie, but I think in the long run it won't matter if they're successful. It's a risky move for sure. I also think it is risky to let Microsoft potentially re-acquire or repartner with Bungie and have a Halo resurgence right when the company was on the ropes. Even the Bungie purchase fails, if Sony prevented an alternate future where Xbox makes a comeback because of Halo 6, it was worth it.

I've criticized Sony's moves around their obsession with trying to make Atrac3 work instead of embracing MP3. Their Software with SonyConnect was absolute trash and significantly behind iTunes. They gave Apple the MP3 player market, which lead directly to a phone that was difficult to compete with in the iPhone.

I think selling Vaio was a mistake. Not selling a MacOS version of Vaio was also a mistake.

Their obsession with high priced memory sticks resulted in not only memory sticks not catching on, but the PSP and Vita being more expensive and harder to support.

I think their decision to alienate Sony Online Entertainment was a mistake. If they leaned into EverQuest it probably would have changed the direction of the company much earlier.

I think they should have invested more in 1st party sooner. If they had kept building certain franchises, they could be significantly bigger today: SOCOM, The Getaway, Resistance, Killzone, Warhawk/Starhawk, MAG. But I understand why they didn't do these things. I also think they should have kept investing in Legend of Dragoon and Arc the Lad, probably even Wild Arms. Persona and Tales show what can happen when you continue to invest.

I think that Sony should have brought back PlayStation Home, especially with VR.

I think not trying to put Dreams on PC was a mistake.

I think they should have purchased Visual Concepts, but I can understand why they didn't.

I thought they should have bought Level-5 and ClapHanz.

I think they should have bought Vivendi Games/Universal Games and retrieved the licenses for Crash Bandicoot and Spyro the dragon.

All of these things are interesting to debate at least to me, but what I also don't know is what efforts Sony made to do any of that or what discussions were had around these subjects. Maybe Sony tried to buy Crash and Spyro multiple times and it just never worked out. Ultimately there is a price that didn't make sense, but now they're with Microsoft, which you probably think is a mistake (despite the fact that these games don't really sell anymore) but think somehow Sony buying Bungie was a bad idea.

I think buying Firesprite will probably end up being a bad purchase and that studio will close down within the next 10 years.

What I also understand is that you're a fanboy who doesn't know what the strength of a company is. You're a fanboy who thinks that if Sony just doubled down on backwards compatibility it would be great. Even though it wouldn't make them ANY money.

PlayStation is changing as a company. What it means to be PlayStation in 2030 isn't going to be what it was in 2015. It's cool if you don't like the new PlayStation, but the change of the industry dictates that Sony change with it if they want to continue being a market leader.

PlayStation will be synonymous with gaming and entertainment not just console gaming, just as Marvel is synonymous with movies more than comics today.

That's why Sony has their foot in the door in VR, Cloud, PC and more so in the future Mobile. They'll leverage PlayStation as a brand to do that, including the expansion of their IP into TV and Movies, which they've been again killing it at.
 

Nhomnhom

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Again with the straw man arguments.

Who said that every move Sony makes is correct?

You're just a fanboy who makes silly arguments. Bungie was a mistake? They created two of the most popular and successful franchises in the history of gaming back to back. That's undeniable.

I think they probably overpaid for Bungie, but I think in the long run it won't matter if they're successful. It's a risky move for sure. I also think it is risky to let Microsoft potentially re-acquire or repartner with Bungie and have a Halo resurgence right when the company was on the ropes. Even the Bungie purchase fails, if Sony prevented an alternate future where Xbox makes a comeback because of Halo 6, it was worth it.

I've criticized Sony's moves around their obsession with trying to make Atrac3 work instead of embracing MP3. Their Software with SonyConnect was absolute trash and significantly behind iTunes. They gave Apple the MP3 player market, which lead directly to a phone that was difficult to compete with in the iPhone.

I think selling Vaio was a mistake. Not selling a MacOS version of Vaio was also a mistake.

Their obsession with high priced memory sticks resulted in not only memory sticks not catching on, but the PSP and Vita being more expensive and harder to support.

I think their decision to alienate Sony Online Entertainment was a mistake. If they leaned into EverQuest it probably would have changed the direction of the company much earlier.

I think they should have invested more in 1st party sooner. If they had kept building certain franchises, they could be significantly bigger today: SOCOM, The Getaway, Resistance, Killzone, Warhawk/Starhawk, MAG. But I understand why they didn't do these things. I also think they should have kept investing in Legend of Dragoon and Arc the Lad, probably even Wild Arms. Persona and Tales show what can happen when you continue to invest.

I think that Sony should have brought back PlayStation Home, especially with VR.

I think not trying to put Dreams on PC was a mistake.

I think they should have purchased Visual Concepts, but I can understand why they didn't.

I thought they should have bought Level-5 and ClapHanz.

I think they should have bought Vivendi Games/Universal Games and retrieved the licenses for Crash Bandicoot and Spyro the dragon.

All of these things are interesting to debate at least to me, but what I also don't know is what efforts Sony made to do any of that or what discussions were had around these subjects. Maybe Sony tried to buy Crash and Spyro multiple times and it just never worked out. Ultimately there is a price that didn't make sense, but now they're with Microsoft, which you probably think is a mistake (despite the fact that these games don't really sell anymore) but think somehow Sony buying Bungie was a bad idea.

I think buying Firesprite will probably end up being a bad purchase and that studio will close down within the next 10 years.

What I also understand is that you're a fanboy who doesn't know what the strength of a company is. You're a fanboy who thinks that if Sony just doubled down on backwards compatibility it would be great. Even though it wouldn't make them ANY money.

PlayStation is changing as a company. What it means to be PlayStation in 2030 isn't going to be what it was in 2015. It's cool if you don't like the new PlayStation, but the change of the industry dictates that Sony change with it if they want to continue being a market leader.

PlayStation will be synonymous with gaming and entertainment not just console gaming, just as Marvel is synonymous with movies more than comics today.

That's why Sony has their foot in the door in VR, Cloud, PC and more so in the future Mobile. They'll leverage PlayStation as a brand to do that, including the expansion of their IP into TV and Movies, which they've been again killing it at.
You come here saying everyone else here lacks understanding, saying opinions that diverge from yours are clownish and only made in hindsight (as if yours were not) and now you want to play the victim? Stfu...

Had Sony double down on PlayStation when they had the chance and believed in their own gaming business you would be here defending those moves as well. Turns out they didn't, they got scared, they didn't see the success of PS4 coming, they got scared of Xbox/Gamepass and started copying their business models and now are unable to change direction and will inevitable meet the same fate.

Nobody is going to take your Sony boot liking seriously we have seen to much of it over the years.

Sony sees traditional console games as a fad that they need to get out off before it's too late as they have made pretty clear with most of their decisions for a long time.
 
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mibu no ookami

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You come here saying everyone else here lacks understanding, saying opinions that diverge from yours are clownish and only made in hindsight (as if yours were not) and now you want to play the victim?

Stfu, nobody is going to take your Sony boot liking seriously and I sure won't be rearing your nonsensical posts anymore.

You are definitely clownish and your arguments are from hindsight.

All the arguments I presented in my last post, I said in real time as things were happening, so no, they weren't hindsight.

When Sony Online Entertainment got restructured into SCEA, I thought it was an opportunity for them to embrace MMORPGs. That and Star Wars Galaxy could have been the opening salvo into what they're trying to do now.

Sony ceded control in FPS to CoD. On PS3 their FPS were actually more popular than CoD until Modern Warfare.

I always said that ClapHanz should have been used a lot of how Sony used Camelot and they kind of tried. They did Hot Shots Tennis, but unlike Nintendo they didn't really use Sony characters which I thought was a marketing mistake.

Unlike you I criticize in real time not just after the fact or without facts at all...

But please, don't read my posts, it's definitely better this way. I really wonder how old some of these posters are.
 

Nhomnhom

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You are definitely clownish and your arguments are from hindsight.

All the arguments I presented in my last post, I said in real time as things were happening, so no, they weren't hindsight.

When Sony Online Entertainment got restructured into SCEA, I thought it was an opportunity for them to embrace MMORPGs. That and Star Wars Galaxy could have been the opening salvo into what they're trying to do now.

Sony ceded control in FPS to CoD. On PS3 their FPS were actually more popular than CoD until Modern Warfare.

I always said that ClapHanz should have been used a lot of how Sony used Camelot and they kind of tried. They did Hot Shots Tennis, but unlike Nintendo they didn't really use Sony characters which I thought was a marketing mistake.

Unlike you I criticize in real time not just after the fact or without facts at all...

But please, don't read my posts, it's definitely better this way. I really wonder how old some of these posters are.
My argument are from hindsight despite the fact that I said them as those things developed? You are the only clown here that doesn't know what he was talking about. I played Demon's Souls in 2009 and Persona games on PSP/PSV before way before they let those obvious opportunities of securing great PlayStation developers pass them buy.

Insomniac purchase looked great from the start, a complete steal.

I opposed Bungie, GaaS pivot and PC ports from the very start.

Sony handling of SOE always looked stupid as fuck.

If you could only see these developments in hindsight that is your limitation, don't project it onto others here.

Idiot takes like thinking Kratos playing tennis or Joel playing golf would've made their games more successful is beyond stupid, Sony is not Nintendo and have completely different strengths.

Your clownish boot liking and nonsensical accusations are disgusting.
 

mibu no ookami

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I opposed Bungie, GaaS pivot and PC ports from the very start.

All of these will be proven as really bad takes.

Helldivers 2 already proves your GaaS "pivot" take as clownish.


If you could only see these developments in hindsight that is your limitation, don't project it onto others here.

It's not just hindsight. You could like Persona and FromSoftware games before they got massively popular, but that doesn't mean that they would be good buys. Those popular games might not have existed at all under Sony management.

Xenoblade wouldn't even exist if Takahashi had stayed with Square. They wouldn't have let him make it.

Name me one FromSoftware exclusive that has sold over 10 million copies on PlayStation. Had Sony bought From it would have doomed Dark Souls and there probably never would have been a Bloodborne, and certainly not an Elden Ring. These games were popular because they sold on Xbox 360 and PC. The 360 had just as high a userbase at the time. Foreclosing Dark Souls 2 as Demon's Souls 2, the game probably wouldn't have sold that well. Dark Souls sold twice as well on PC as it did consoles combined.

As a PlayStation game alone, it's less successful as the Quantic Dream games.

I would say FromSoftware is only worth it now BECAUSE Sony is willing to do PC ports which you actually have a problem with.



Idiot takes like thinking Kratos playing tennis or Joel playing golf would've made their games more successful is beyond stupid, Sony is not Nintendo and have completely different strengths.

Maybe you started gaming with the PS3, but Sony used to do extremely well with family and kid games. Sony historically failed to cross market their IPs, which is what limited the growth of ALL their IP. They used to shy away from doing game bundles too, with very few games getting long standing bundles like GT3.

This lack of cross promotion is why a lot of franchises are no longer with us, but better believe Helldivers will get a tie in with Starship Troopers (Sony Pictures), Killzone and Destiny (Sony Interactive).

Bungie put in armor types as nods to Horizon, God of War, and Ghost of Tsushima. Does this make Destiny sell better? No, not necessarily, but it keeps people's minds on franchises, which keeps franchises relevant, which is exactly why Fornite and Smash have had great success with character crossovers, as has Mortal Kombat.
 

Nhomnhom

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All of these will be proven as really bad takes.

Helldivers 2 already proves your GaaS "pivot" take as clownish.
Lmao, Helldivers 2 is not the result of the GaaS pivot, it is the result of continuing to work with a good developer and betting on quality over chasing trends. Arrowhead is the complete opposite of something like Bungie.

PC ports are already a failure to anyone except the most hardcore boot liking fans, even their most established IPs sell like shit on PC and on top of that 30% goes to Valve.

Maybe you started gaming with the PS3, but Sony used to do extremely well with family and kid games. Sony historically failed to cross market their IPs, which is what limited the growth of ALL their IP. They used to shy away from doing game bundles too, with very few games getting long standing bundles like GT3.

This lack of cross promotion is why a lot of franchises are no longer with us, but better believe Helldivers will get a tie in with Starship Troopers (Sony Pictures), Killzone and Destiny (Sony Interactive).

Bungie put in armor types as nods to Horizon, God of War, and Ghost of Tsushima. Does this make Destiny sell better? No, not necessarily, but it keeps people's minds on franchises, which keeps franchises relevant, which is exactly why Fornite and Smash have had great success with character crossovers, as has Mortal Kombat.
Maybe you are stupid enough to think Ratchet and Clank or Sly Cooper are remotely in the same ballpark as Mario or Pokemon.

Bungie and Epic, wow, what great examples to follow. TLoU, Uncharted and GoW don't need help from Destiny to sell a single additional copy, garbage like Destiny devalues the strong PlayStation brand, pure poison in the long run.
 
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mibu no ookami

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Lmao, Helldivers 2 is not the result of the GaaS pivot, it is the result of continuing to work with a good developer and betting on quality over chasing trends. Arrowhead is the complete opposite of something like Bungie.

PC ports are already a failure to anyone except the most hardcore boot liking fans, even their most established IPs sell like shit on PC and on top of that 30% goes to Valve.

When Final Shape sells well, you will say it doesn't matter and that it was still a bad decision. When Marathon is a huge success... you'll still say it doesn't matter and that it was still a bad decision.

Ultimately, you aren't basing this on facts or business, you're basing it on your fanboy ideology.

Both Final Shape and Marathon will be on PC.

You still think for some reason that Sony needs these PC ports to sell 5+ million copies a piece. They don't. It doesn't cost a lot to develop ports and the margins only help them reduce the overall sales to cost ratio.


Maybe you are stupid enough to think Ratchet and Clank or Sly Cooper are remotely in the same ballpark as Mario or Pokemon.

Who said Ratchet or Sly need to be as big as Mario or Pokemon in order to get a general boost from being consistently shown in media?

Why put Homelander in Mortal Kombat? Why did Sony show Spider-Man 2 in Across the Spider-Verse?

Bungie and Epic, wow, what great examples to follow. TLoU, Uncharted and GoW don't need help from Destiny to sell a single additional copy, garbage like Destiny devalues the strong PlayStation brand, pure poison in the long run.

Two of the biggest companies in gaming... lol... yes...

And again, it's not necessarily about selling more copies of TLOU, Uncharted, or GOW. At least not directly. It's about raising the consciousness of these IP any chance you get. That's how transmedia works, and yes transmedia DOES increase sales, that's absolutely proven.

You might not like Destiny, but it doesn't change the fact that it's one of the biggest games on the planet.
 

Eternal_Wings

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Square Enix would be bad purchase is the most ridiculous thing I have heard here in the forum. By then I believe you're some troll or a Nintendo fanboy which doesn't want to see Sony buying SE.
 
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Nhomnhom

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When Final Shape sells well, you will say it doesn't matter and that it was still a bad decision. When Marathon is a huge success... you'll still say it doesn't matter and that it was still a bad decision.

Ultimately, you aren't basing this on facts or business, you're basing it on your fanboy ideology.

Both Final Shape and Marathon will be on PC.

You still think for some reason that Sony needs these PC ports to sell 5+ million copies a piece. They don't. It doesn't cost a lot to develop ports and the margins only help them reduce the overall sales to cost ratio.




Who said Ratchet or Sly need to be as big as Mario or Pokemon in order to get a general boost from being consistently shown in media?

Why put Homelander in Mortal Kombat? Why did Sony show Spider-Man 2 in Across the Spider-Verse?



Two of the biggest companies in gaming... lol... yes...

And again, it's not necessarily about selling more copies of TLOU, Uncharted, or GOW. At least not directly. It's about raising the consciousness of these IP any chance you get. That's how transmedia works, and yes transmedia DOES increase sales, that's absolutely proven.

You might not like Destiny, but it doesn't change the fact that it's one of the biggest games on the planet.
Like as if Destiny hadn't sold well before, again you miss the point entirelly.

Of course Destiny and Bungie needs to be big they paid billions for it and it hardly helps PlayStation at all given that it's a multiplataform game like it was before.

They showed again and again that they are afraid to bet big on PlayStation and that they don't believe consoles have a longterm future. It's a self fulfilling prophecy that will be the end of PlayStation dominance on consoles and likelly will take down their entire shithole company, deservedly so.
 
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Yurinka

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LOL, just say you were wrong. Sony has restructured studios many times. SCE barely did internal development back in the day, but we're talking about PlayStation as a whole not just SCEA. Before 989 Sports existed it was an internal team at 989 Studios, before they were 989 studios they were Sony Interactive Studios America, before they were Sony Interactive Studios America, they were Sony Imagesoft.
I wasn't wrong, you are wrong. SCE had several studios.

In 1998 one of them, Sony Interactive Studios America, was separated from Sony Computer Entertainment (what now is known as SIE) and was rebranded as 989 Studios. 2 years later, got reacquired by SCE in 2000 as I said.

What exists at San Diego Studio existed well before they bought Red Zone Interactive and they were already making the MLB games that would turn into The Show. In addition Red Zone Interactive was former members of that same company. They basically just brought them back.
No, it didn't. As I said, San Diego Studio was the name they did put to the merged team of Redzone and 989 Studios. Until Sony acquired Red zone in 2001, Redzone was a 2nd party studio, who previously made the NFL GameDay games for 989 Sports.

My point is that gives validity to the rumors. Please show me where they were mentioned as being rejected and too tied to Sony.
As I remember it was in some ABK court documents, maybe in FTC one, I don't have them now and don't exactly remember which one were.

To an extent, but you're conflating the era of easy money to an era of high interest rates and low sales. As I said, consolidation is going to happen more along terms of mergers rather than acquisition. You're going to see more like sized companies merge their companies rather than see large companies purchase large publishers to foreclose from Sony.
Smaller companies that run out of money don't merge with other ones of similar size. They sell their company to a bigger one. An acquisition, not a merge.

We'll continue to see acquisitions, because big players have money and smaller players are seeing publishers getting more conservative with the games they sign and investors moving away from gaming to invest instead in other markets with bigger growth like AI, plus in some cases they see their growth getting stagnant or even dissapearing and decreaing in revenue. So the only possibility they see to grow is to sell the company to someone who can help grow in new markets or helping them with different synergies.

Case in point, none of these resulted in foreclosure.
As I said Take 2 acquired Zynga. Bandai Namco, Capcom and Square Enix don't have any reason to sell, it would be stupid to do so when they have been growing their revenue, so growing their valuation. And they continue with this trend, meaning they will be more valuable in the short/medium term. It's smarter to hold and wait until somewhere in the future once they can't grow anymore. Then at that point, before they got stagnant it would be smart to sell.


Microsoft itself is already going 3rd party.
They did 10 years ago when they acquired Mojang and kept them as multiplatform.

There is little value in Sony buying a company to take on their debt and risk if it's not getting exclusive games
Square Enix, Capcom, Bandai Namco or Sega have no debt issues at all. And acquiring them, as happened with Mojang, Bethesda, Bungie or ABK wouldn't be to get exclusives: it would be to get the money they make in all platforms.

The console market is a small portion of the gaming market, and the consoles war is over and the consoles userbase doesn't significantly grow since decades ago. So all publishers, including MS and Sony, have been expanding to full multiplatform to continue growing. So when they buy a big multiplatform company them keep them multiplatform because the main reason of why they acquired that company is to get the money they make in all platforms. It would be stupid to make them exclusive and leave a ton of money in the table when this is going to be the only consequence of making them exclsive, since they know sales won't change meaningfully because these companies represent a tiny market share, too small to compenste the money they'd stop earning in other platforms.

and there is no longer any value in foreclosing on Xbox. The question is whether there is value on foreclosing on Switch and the answer is likely no.
Xbox is a dead brand, nobody would be intterested on buying it. Regarding Switch, nobody gives a fuck about it other than Nintendo. But the thing is, 3rd party publishers now know that after PSP, Vita and Switch, now there's a PC handheld market. Like portable consoles but they don't need to make games exclusively developed for them or make specific ports, which was a waste of money particularly for AAA IPs because outiside only a few 3rd party cases, sales weren't worth it.

PC handhelds allow them to simply use their PC sku there, maybe providing only some game settings profile with a good enough configuration to run the game there recently.

If someone -particularly Valve or Sony- manages to make a PC handheld as powerful or more than Switch 2 and Steamdeck but priced as a handheld console to make it accessible to the mainstream then Nintendo will be fucked and they'll lose the portables market because they'll lose the 3rd party support they have becoming a new WiiU.

If Sony bought Square Enix they would absolutely stop them publishing on Xbox. Same with any other company you listed. Bungie was a rare exception.
No, they would do the same than with Mojang, Zenimax, ABK and Bungie. They are businessmen, not brainless fanboys. They want to make more money.

Sony will put out their own handheld in a couple years. We'll see how likely they are to not want to foreclose on Switch then.
Sony won't release any handheld in a couple years.

In a couple years (maybe more likely 3 or 4, when they release PS6), they may release their PC and mobile stores and will slowly populate it with 1st and 3rd party games.

Some time after the PS6 release, once these stores are populated, I think they may release as mid gen refresh their PS Player successor for PS6, which I think in addition to remote play and cloud gaming will also feature native games from their PC store (which may also include their mobile games).

If they do so, combined with the rest of PC handhelds who would have increased their market share slowly over time after releasing cheaper models, Nintendo's handheld would be in big trouble because would lose most key 3rd party support they already have. Only the hardcore Nintendo fans who stayed in WiiU would remain there.


They went from 3.8 billion USD in market cap to 4.47 billion in market cap in 10 years... that is not a success.
C'mon, stop being a gaming flatearther.

I posted you the graph showing they grew from $2.38B to $4.4B in 10 years, almost doubling the value. Only a retarded would say that this isn't a success. 99% of the companies would kill to double their market cap every 10 years.
 

mibu no ookami

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21 Feb 2024
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I wasn't wrong, you are wrong. SCE had several studios.

In 1998 one of them, Sony Interactive Studios America, was separated from Sony Computer Entertainment (what now is known as SIE) and was rebranded as 989 Studios. 2 years later, got reacquired by SCE in 2000 as I said.

A restructuring isn't an acquisition.

No, it didn't. As I said, San Diego Studio was the name they did put to the merged team of Redzone and 989 Studios. Until Sony acquired Red zone in 2001, Redzone was a 2nd party studio, who previously made the NFL GameDay games for 989 Sports.

The MLB series predates Redzone being acquired. Look it up.

As I remember it was in some ABK court documents, maybe in FTC one, I don't have them now and don't exactly remember which one were.

It's simply not true.
Smaller companies that run out of money don't merge with other ones of similar size. They sell their company to a bigger one. An acquisition, not a merge.

When two companies form a new company, that is in fact a merger. Square Enix, Namco Bandai, Sega Sammy, Koei Tecmo... all mergers...

We'll continue to see acquisitions, because big players have money and smaller players are seeing publishers getting more conservative with the games they sign and investors moving away from gaming to invest instead in other markets with bigger growth like AI, plus in some cases they see their growth getting stagnant or even dissapearing and decreaing in revenue. So the only possibility they see to grow is to sell the company to someone who can help grow in new markets or helping them with different synergies.

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.

As I said Take 2 acquired Zynga. Bandai Namco, Capcom and Square Enix don't have any reason to sell, it would be stupid to do so when they have been growing their revenue, so growing their valuation. And they continue with this trend, meaning they will be more valuable in the short/medium term. It's smarter to hold and wait until somewhere in the future once they can't grow anymore. Then at that point, before they got stagnant it would be smart to sell.


This is a massively nothing statement.

They did 10 years ago when they acquired Mojang and kept them as multiplatform.


Square Enix, Capcom, Bandai Namco or Sega have no debt issues at all. And acquiring them, as happened with Mojang, Bethesda, Bungie or ABK wouldn't be to get exclusives: it would be to get the money they make in all platforms.

So who is going to buy these companies and when?

The console market is a small portion of the gaming market, and the consoles war is over and the consoles userbase doesn't significantly grow since decades ago. So all publishers, including MS and Sony, have been expanding to full multiplatform to continue growing. So when they buy a big multiplatform company them keep them multiplatform because the main reason of why they acquired that company is to get the money they make in all platforms. It would be stupid to make them exclusive and leave a ton of money in the table when this is going to be the only consequence of making them exclsive, since they know sales won't change meaningfully because these companies represent a tiny market share, too small to compenste the money they'd stop earning in other platforms.

Microsoft bought Zenimax and immediately looked to foreclose. 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.

Xbox is a dead brand, nobody would be intterested on buying it. Regarding Switch, nobody gives a fuck about it other than Nintendo. But the thing is, 3rd party publishers now know that after PSP, Vita and Switch, now there's a PC handheld market. Like portable consoles but they don't need to make games exclusively developed for them or make specific ports, which was a waste of money particularly for AAA IPs because outiside only a few 3rd party cases, sales weren't worth it.

PC handhelds allow them to simply use their PC sku there, maybe providing only some game settings profile with a good enough configuration to run the game there recently.

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.

If someone -particularly Valve or Sony- manages to make a PC handheld as powerful or more than Switch 2 and Steamdeck but priced as a handheld console to make it accessible to the mainstream then Nintendo will be fucked and they'll lose the portables market because they'll lose the 3rd party support they have becoming a new WiiU.

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.

No, they would do the same than with Mojang, Zenimax, ABK and Bungie. They are businessmen, not brainless fanboys. They want to make more money.


Sony won't release any handheld in a couple years.

Look up the video by MLID. You can state that, but it flies in the face of what we have actually heard.

In a couple years (maybe more likely 3 or 4, when they release PS6), they may release their PC and mobile stores and will slowly populate it with 1st and 3rd party games.

Some time after the PS6 release, once these stores are populated, I think they may release as mid gen refresh their PS Player successor for PS6, which I think in addition to remote play and cloud gaming will also feature native games from their PC store (which may also include their mobile games).

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.

If they do so, combined with the rest of PC handhelds who would have increased their market share slowly over time after releasing cheaper models, Nintendo's handheld would be in big trouble because would lose most key 3rd party support they already have. Only the hardcore Nintendo fans who stayed in WiiU would remain there.

See above.

C'mon, stop being a gaming flatearther.

I posted you the graph showing they grew from $2.38B to $4.4B in 10 years, almost doubling the value. Only a retarded would say that this isn't a success. 99% of the companies would kill to double their market cap every 10 years.

Only a retarded? If you're going to insult someone, try and have some decent grammar and spelling.

Their CARG has been awful. No one would say that this stock has managed a reasonable return rate, which would be at least 6 percent growth annually.
 

mibu no ookami

Veteran
21 Feb 2024
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Like as if Destiny hadn't sold well before, again you miss the point entirelly.

Of course Destiny and Bungie needs to be big they paid billions for it and it hardly helps PlayStation at all given that it's a multiplataform game like it was before.

They showed again and again that they are afraid to bet big on PlayStation and that they don't believe consoles have a longterm future. It's a self fulfilling prophecy that will be the end of PlayStation dominance on consoles and likelly will take down their entire shithole company, deservedly so.

What a clown-ish statement, but you proved my point. To you there is no definition of success Sony can have with Bungie.

They could bring in 10 billion dollars and to you it would still be a mistake because you think Sony has betrayed your fanboy sensibilities.
 

Eternal_Wings

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24 Jun 2022
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Guys you need to relax, no need to beef over possible M&A activities from Sony. We are speculating based on rumoursamd observation, it doesn't lie in our hands if Sony would buy Sega, Square Enix or whoever.
 

Nhomnhom

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25 Mar 2023
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Guys you need to relax, no need to beef over possible M&A activities from Sony. We are speculating based on rumoursamd observation, it doesn't lie in our hands if Sony would buy Sega, Square Enix or whoever.
There is no point in discussing with a guy that just go around the forum insulting every other user that doesn't agree with all his basic takes that take every PR statement and spin from Sony at face value. The ignore list is the only place a person like that belongs, too much time was already wasted with this guy.
 

Yurinka

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21 Jun 2022
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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.

It's simply not true.
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

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