Call them shit pubs all you want, games like COD and GTA sell millions and generate billions in revenue & profit. IP of that size being consolidated under Microsoft's ownership, when it's not even evident they will be able to maintain (let alone grow & improve) IP like DOOM or TES should be very worrying.
And, those IP crashing and burning would mean millions of people now having less choices in terms of gaming content. Heck look at the reduction of choices that've come about due to the Rare acquisition, how long it's taken some IP like Perfect Dark to even come back. It's always a question of management & creative pursuit when it comes to Microsoft gaming leadership.
I respectfully disagree. I'll take each publishers apart.
T2 - Made 3 games since 2013; Gta and RDR. They've got lazy and have milked one franchise for 10 years, getting greedy from MTX, rather than making another game. GTA 5 was shit, GTA will be terrible. Zelnick is a scumbag who I wouldn't piss on to put him out if he was on fire.
EA - Haven't made a good game in years. Went woke with Battlefield and then went broke. they doubled down and blamed the fans. Then gave the fans the middle finger with the newest battlefield by promising a single-player campaign, then pulled it. They exist on MTX and scumbag practices. Targetting kids with FIFA packs is despicable and the EA C-Suite should be tarred and feathered, then pelted with rotten fruit.
Ubisoft - Had a few decent R6 games, then ruined them through greed, P2W and MTX. Watch dogs went shit when they tried to maximise on the cross-gen double-dipping and ruined both versions. AC has been shit since AC2 and they refuse to innovate, instead opting to go the route of bloated, open-world, cookie-cutter collectathons while milking the franchise to the ground. Look how many AC games are in development. Far Cry is fucking garbage. They're scumbags.
ABK - lolworthy publisher (and this has nothing to do with the MS purchase) COD has been on life support since Fortnite and Apex came on the scene. They've kept it afloat by creating a F2P version and then lying about player counts. Two shite remakes, of which one never had their most popular campaign. Tony Hawks was wank. Guitar Hero milked to oblivion. WoW is on life support and the expansions and remakes landed with widespread disgust from fans. Overwatch 2 is cancelling the single player and is a scumbag mtx-farm aimed at kids. No one has heard from Hearthstone for years. Crash Bandicoot should have stayed with Sony.
As far as i'm concerned, the best thing that could happen to the industry is MS buying up all the above platforms, take all the American greed, MTX-riddled, corporate-created shite games and crash the industry right up each others arses with no survivors.
Disclaimer : I hope no one comes to harm and those who lose their jobs under this scenario find places to work and no financial difficulties befall them, with the exceptions of the top level managers who are forced to work in Mcdonalds and give all of their money to charity.
