complete delusion. they sold 15M Borderlands 3 copies. Franchise sold 74M. niche
Sony's future and possible studio/publisher acquisitions
- Thread starter Eternal_Wings
- Start date
I thought we were still talking Spiderman/Marvel (which Disney will never give up,) didn't realize the discussion had moved on to KH.
So, no big news yesterday or today from Sony.... guess they are really playing it safe still.
And will continue to do so till next fiscal year, I assume.
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So, no big news yesterday or today from Sony.... guess they are really playing it safe still.
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I think Sony will not do something until Activision Blizzard is 100% cleared. If this year then I assume 2023 November. Busy month in Japan and also where traditionally a lot of things like mergers/buyouts happen.
I think I'm on board with that idea, it makes a lot of sense with their financial planning, possibly spinning off the banking etc.
I wonder if they'll get to keep the reserves as well? Or that goes with the banking arm? Because I think they took like 12 billion or so out of their cash on hand when they changed how they accounted for their cash on hand last year?
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Why November. Acquisition can be reported at any quarterly shareholders meetings
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Not in Japan. Its just an observation but it’s true that in November Japanese do mergers & buyouts in this month. It’s a special month, why exactly so I can’t confirm for sure. All I know in Japan it needs to be in periods. But Genki did last year a thread about it.
My guess is that November is when Bank of Japan filing of their financial statement on first half of fiscal year, since they own stake and control preferred shares of 80% of big corporations in Japan.
But why not May? I haven't seen big M&A outside of banks and financial groups in Japan for a really long time, and usually it's either May or November.
So in other words Sony are going to let this deal make them hold gamers hostage until November? Because that's the way I see it. They should not even be planning so reactively to this deal; if you've got some things lined up yourself then get going and get them done. You know anyway that if the deal somehow fails, Microsoft will just try getting someone else.
I think more frustrating is the silence from 1P teams in terms of traditional AAA or AA sequels or new IP. The May showcase had absolutely nothing in that regard outside of Spiderman 2, and if they're waiting on ABK getting cleared or not to even show of more of those games, then their management decision-making is slipping in areas IMHO. Communication is already virtually dead-silent from them to fans online.
It's one of the few things I can give partial credit to Microsoft for; while the shill-infested astroturfing campaign is a part of it (and is 100% toxic), while people like Good Guy Phil™ are just empty words when it comes to their gaming kumbaya...at least they have personable faces among their brand who do directly communicate with fans and media alike. Sony really needs to bring Kevin Butler back, and maybe a few interns or something with him, who can serve as both marketing and faces of the brand engaging with fans online and media in certain interviews.
Microsoft just ripped off the whole Kevin Butler stuff anyway, but it was a mistake for Sony to phase them out when there's still a lot they can be used for especially in combating Microsoft's insane online shill, astroturfing and influencer efforts online.
Okay, that's interesting. Didn't know this before.
It still doesn't particularly answer my questions above about showing off more 1P games or doing something for renewed online marketing & messaging influence to combat MS's BS influences, but it does potentially answer a question as to why Sony won't make any acquisition announcements until November, which is pertinent to the thread.
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I think there won’t be any big event until October passes. The biggest and last release from PS Studios will be Spiderman 2 and that’s it I think.
Of course there some big games like AC coming and other 3rd Party games. But I honestly don’t think except them to do anything big until at least November.
Maybe they do a showcase in December.
September, they gonna unveil the PS5 revision like they always do as well as a bunch of new games. FF7, Rise of Ronin, Stellar Blade all have 2024 Winter-Spring release date.
It also sucks and is less inspired that the average Ubisoft game.
People here just want Sony to turn into a mediocre or even bellow average publisher for some reason as if that would be a positive thing for PlayStation fans. Any fan of PlayStation games is a fan because they stand out, it would not be a win if they were to grow by absorbing publishers of far lesser quality.
The thing about Xbox is that between Xbox, Bethesda, Blizzard and Activision they were likely the worst of the bunch to begin with.
They have the luxury of having BG3 console exclusive and Spider-man 2 coming up. Unfortunately it's going to be really easy for them to not do anything.
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In fairness, Embracer actually does have a few big franchises. Its hard to say they are billion dollar franchises but games only even things like Sonic and Crash aren't billion dollar franchises anymore, so thats a tough hill to climb. Here's some of their "good shit": Lord of the Rings (everything but books), Asmodee (multibillion dollar board-game maker), Tomb Raider, Deus Ex, Bloxburg (big money maker, even if nobody here knows or cares about Roblox), Deep Rock Galactic (sucessful recent GaaS), Borderlands, Dead Island, Metro, Biomutant (discount bin Kena,) and Gothic. Those are all "good" game series but aside from LotR and Borderlands (and maybe Dead Island) there's a lot of "what have you done for me lately" energy in there. I don't think they'd be allowed to just cherry-pick the good stuff either. Even though their CEO is dragging his feet on it, Embracer's current strategic goal is to trim the fat and focus in on exloiting its own successful IP. You don't do that by selling all the best bits off.
Since Sony signed a deal with Xbox for Cod, I think that means MS wont mettle with PS plans for buying publishers, since they helped them out. Whether they signed that contract in distress or willing is unknown i guess. I think all the big publishers are off the table for Sony. Such as Take Two, EA, Ubisoft etc. Most likely will be a Japanese publisher