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Squilliam on 22 June 2009
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kaneada said:
Squilliam said:

This game is a little more complicated than what it appears to be on the surface. Activision are the largest 3rd party publisher in existance right now. They have games which hold a lot of sway with consumers -> Diablo, Call of Duty/Modern Warfare and Guitar Hero are the main ones. They also hold a lot of sway with other publishers as well, when they jump one way they will definately send ripples amongst the others. Since we don't know precisely whats going on behind the scenes to motivate them to make such statements its hard to determine exactly what they want to happen behind the scenes. Its further complicated because we don't exactly know what conversations they are having with Nintendo and Microsoft regarding their games as well.

Long term, I would say perhaps they may consider themselves better off with a two horse race than a three horse race, especially if the other console manufacturers make it worth the trouble. This is considering that perhaps Sony is unwilling to cut the price significantly enough for their liking and because of that they feel that the future profitability from the PS3 platform is being hurt so they would wish to act now and aquire a positition which is in their own best interest with platforms which are selling much better in their key western markets.

I sniff fear all over Activisions statments. I think its more likely that Activision bought way too much property and its not profitable for them to remain as large as they are. In order to do so they need to drive up game attach rates across the board. Threatening Sony is a bad idea for them and shows their desperation. 

We know that M$ will buy their way through any situation and make it beyond profitable for them to develop for their console and Nintendo is in excellent standings, so they are bullying the underdog to keep from eating the costs of too much investing in a unstable market. I wouldn't take Activisons threats lightly, but at the same time I don't think they carry much weight. If I'm right and there sales are low, they may follow through  thinking that less development cost will offset the loss of sales on the actual product.

Sony made the smart move by blasting numbers all over the place to let them know, they can survive without them. If Sony remains strong on this, Activison is going to have to consider their numbers and make choices internally rather than externally.

My point: Activision's motives for this are not what they appear to be. I'd be willing to bet that their profit reports will reflect a better idea of what their situation and reasons actually are.

I don't think fear is appropriate description when describing a large multinational company. They are playing the game to their advantage and Sony are just the easiest target to try to play. The costs of the royalties may be quite significant, see my other post above and that may be one of their primary motivators.

http://vgchartz.com/games/index.php?&results=50&name=&console=PS3&keyword=&publisher=14&genre=&order=Sales&boxart=Both&showdeleted=&region=All&alphasort=

If you follow the above link you'll see that besides Call of Duty and Guitar Hero they don't have significant success outside of these main franchises and they could easily drop PS3 development and likely save money in the process. So their threat is fairly credible, and can be carried out without too much pain on their end. The significance isn't in the actual games but the message sent to the market and other publishers who may consider doing the same, as well as the message to consumers when they see fewer game releases for the PS3.



Tease.