PlayStation Studios Head Says Sony Isn’t Taking Devs off Market with Acquisitions
- Thread starter TubzGaming
- Start date
Yet you always rush to downplay or naysay anything positive about it.
No I don't, I defend Playstation all the time.
And I want MS's Activision acquisition to fail.
Try again.
Anyways the words are just hilarious to me, and I find a lot of the "nuance" a bit tired as well.
Insomniac absolutely was taken off the market... they had just made an Xbox exclusive, since.. they were an independent dev who apparently liked "exclusive game contracts."
I'd absolutely rather anyone buy smaller devs, than big publishers, and MS has gotten out of hand. There can be nuance in a discussion without proclaiming a corporate talking head "right" when they are just denying the basics of reality lol Or using Insomniac as an example when clearly, they were not bound to Sony in any way.
Insomniac absolutely was taken off the market... they had just made an Xbox exclusive, since.. they were an independent dev who apparently liked "exclusive game contracts."
I'd absolutely rather anyone buy smaller devs, than big publishers, and MS has gotten out of hand. There can be nuance in a discussion without proclaiming a corporate talking head "right" when they are just denying the basics of reality lol Or using Insomniac as an example when clearly, they were not bound to Sony in any way.
Hmm...makes me think that Sony will take more of a Tencent strategy going forward, i.e buying up larger shares (and potentially majority shares) in various 3P devs and publishers, and maybe only outright acquire very specific 3P developers.
Honestly, it's a strategy that makes sense and affords many of the same benefits as outright buying 3P publishers for example, just without disrupting the state of the independent, open free market of 3Ps. Something I've talked about in the past as being a big concern, especially depending on what companies in particular are buying up these publishers.
So I think we're going to see Sony do a lot more shareholder investments like recently with Kadokawa and From Software. On that front, they might increase their stakes in From Soft, but I think Kadokawa would have to provide more up for sale so that's on them. Ideally, Sony should try doing this with as many of the big 3P publishers as they can: Capcom, Square-Enix, Sega, Koei-Tecmo, Bandai-Namco, Take-Two, EA, Ubisoft...smaller publishers too like Devolver and Annapurna etc. Buy enough stakes to where there's some financial gain for them, and where they can have some influence in certain decisions, but otherwise those publishers are able to operate as independent 3P entities for most other things.
Since they aren't being purchased outright, there's no need for other people to fearmonger about games being taken away, or stuff like that. Sony may not get ownership of their IPs, tech resources, or be able to integrate their revenue and profits with PlayStation's, but it still fortifies 3P relationships and makes it easier for them to probably get first dibs on certain opportunities WRT software or transmedia production with projects of those publishers.
For certain 3P developers, however, I still think they're going to consider acquisitions. Teams like Ember Lab and Deviation Games would be key targets I suppose. While a lot of people lump them in with a future MS dev to be acquired, I actually think Sony should also consider Asobo, if Asobo are up for looking for acquirement. They could be a great sister studio to the likes of Naughty Dog, in fact there are probably tech resources and techniques the two can share and cross-pollination of talent could lead to some really cool stuff. Plus it would be neat to see something like A Plague's Tale with a Sony AAA budget behind it, and techniques the studio developed while working on Flight Simulator (if not the actual specific technology, as it belongs to Microsoft) can be useful for Polyphony Digital in future Gran Turismo projects.
That really seems like a pretty realistic and ideal path for them in terms of investments and acquisitions.
I remember when mascots were more important than big wigs and business deals to gamers.
Every second thread is about the boring side of gaming these days.... I miss arguing about gears of war vs uncharted.
Every second thread is about the boring side of gaming these days.... I miss arguing about gears of war vs uncharted.
And I'm absolutely not posting in bad faith.
I'd say the same thing about a dev MS paid to make Xbox games "almost exclusively." How is it bad faith to say.. well they weren't exclusive.. they were in fact on the market... and Sony did absolutely take them off the market?
It's the truth, it's a fact, etc.. in any literal sense.
I personally just find the "well they mostly accepted exclusive contracts from XYZ" argument to really have much bearing. Insomniac is a perfect example of that. They were on the market the entire time, not actually exclusive to Sony.. the Xbox contract is an example of that..
I'd rather console manufacturers not buy up any form of exclusivity and you'll find I'm pretty consistent in that. Lesser of 2 evils is releasing on PC as well, and I've been consistent on being happy Sony is moving that way. I've outright flipped my mind into thinking "I'd rather Sony buy a company than MS" as my only logic for believing otherwise was PC releases. Considering Sony seems the better Sheppard of devs at this point and also has the best hardware, it's an easy choice for me as long as Sony keeps releasing games on PC.
That doesn't make Hulsts comments any less bullshit lol And me favoring Sony didn't suddenly make me a big cheerleader for them, I'm just a fan who will also speak my mind, particularly in making fun of their corporate bullshit.
Yep, really good strat, Fromsoft are still free to make multiplat games but now most likely can’t be outright bought by a platform holder without going through sony, cause they aren’t gonna sell their shares and they can increase them if they feel someone is sniffing around.
Sony have shares in multiple companies, Kadokawa and Fromsoftware, Dimps, Epic,etc. im sure they will be buying a large stake in square enix soon
Yeah they put out two games on xbox in 24 years, one of them being exclusive in which they still own the IP.
Theres just as much chance of insomniac making another xbox game today as there was before they were bought
That's technically true. I mean they did buy Psygnosis, but the IP Pygnosis worked on post-acquisition were pretty much all new IP that didn't exist on Sega or Nintendo systems prior.
With Bungie, they've already stated Destiny will remain multiplatform in perpetuity, and that's the only IP Bungie actually own (they may own Marathon still but that's a dead IP that only hardcore Apple fans played in the '90s anyway, I don't think they would care if Marathon was revived and became a PlayStation exclusive
).Lol that's not quite exactly what he said. I mean, I get your POV too, but there ARE other ways to gain those bargaining chips: just buy large shares in as many 3P publishers as possible
.It's cheaper overall than buying singular big publishers outright and brings many of the same benefits. While it doesn't stop other companies from buying a publisher, you at least have a decent say in whether the deal gets corporate approval (depends on your shares), and the buyer doesn't in fact "buy out" your shares in the company, either. You still get to keep them.
EDIT: Well, you DO lose the shares but what actually happens is your old shares are replaced by equivalent new shares of the new entity post-acquisition. That's with stock-to-stock mergers which are often how it's done. Microsoft's actually doing an all-cash buyout of ABK so current shareholders will have their stocks wiped out once the merger's completed (IF it's completed :/)
Here's a briefing of the M&A types (from Upcounsel):
Yep, more or less my sentiments. Start up new new studios or new teams in current studios with hired talent, buy up smaller studios to invest and grow in, etc. I still think Sony need to consider trying to acquire a few 3P developers in particular (Ember Lab, Deviation, Asobo), but for 3P publishers I think they can just do more of what they've done with Kadokawa and From Soft: buy available (or made-available) shares in the company. Square-Enix will probably be one such publisher Sony does that with (maybe Nintendo as well), considering SE are outright opening up such options for investors.
If Sony actually do look into acquiring a publisher, it would probably be one where they already have such investments in, and just based off today I don't think that includes companies like EA or Ubisoft. They could still buy shares in them, of course, but the companies themselves have to decide to provide the option, and that comes from the board I imagine. I don't know everything into how publicly-traded companies decide to make new shares available (outside of stuff like share buy-backs), but whatever the case, the decision's still on the publisher itself.
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Do they have any shares in Capcom? I'm hoping so just because of the Sazzy Group rumors of looking to buy a big publisher, though I think those guys are looking into a European publisher, likely Ubisoft.
People forget Rainbow Six is pretty big in eSports and Ubisoft owns the IP. Plus Ubisoft are the only big 3P publisher of late that's publicly said they are looking into going full-tilt on live-service style games, and they already have other shooter IP like The Division 2. Just seems like they want to push even bigger into eSports and FPS/shooter games have way more traction in the eSports circuit than fighters, genre-wise.
If you're into retro games I'm hoping to do more threads with reviews on those kind of games. Still need to finish one for Planet Laika, gonna do one for Shining Force III Scenario 1 soon (maybe Phantasy Star IV and Loddos-Tou Senkai later down the line).
I know personally I can get caught up in talking the consoles too much but it's important to remember it's really about the games, past and present IMO. Looking forward to hopefully doing some stuff for GOW Ragnarok, HFW, maybe Sonic Frontiers (the recent previews are actually good) etc. Just a matter of free time.
You want it to fail? Any particular reason why?
Personally I don't cheerlead for acquisitions or hold bated breath a company buys someone or an announced deal falls apart. It is what it is. But in general I have my feelings on acquisitions and where I feel with each of the big players who could be looking to do more.
With Microsoft I genuinely don't think they need any further gaming acquisitions for some years if/when this ABK one is approved. That's already 30+ teams between them, Zenimax, the 2018 buys and their original studios. Show us what you can really do with those teams for a while with some big results, then maybe talk up and look into another acquisition a few years from now.
Maybe a smaller dev or two wouldn't add a ton more but the way Satya is talking they're seemingly thinking of going after another big publisher. Even a mid-sized dev like Asobo would be rocking the boat too much for me (that and Asobo seem to still want to stay independent).
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I think the only worry for sony right now is microsoft. They are the only ones with the potential to buy a large publishers and block those games from coming to playstation.
As we’re seeing now sumo digital was purchased Tencent earlier this year and they’re still working on a AAA playstation exclusive. Tencent doesn’t care as long as they get their money.
Yeah, if anything this protects a 20 year investment of sonys. They built that studio over 3 decades, microsoft commissioning them for one game doesn’t change the fact that they were always a 2nd party playstation studio.
I would feel the same if Microsoft bought Certain Affinity or Asobo studios, to a lesser extent.
What do any of these words have to do with your completely bad faith/patently untrue/just blatant lie statement you made?