Sony on 3rd party exclusivity

[Twistedpixel]

Bastables said:

No of course you were not talking about it, as that bit of history puts holes into your construction of microsoft as a more benvolent publisher/games company that looks after it's ips through to the end of time, you know like all those dead ages games, the mech warrior games, rise games, close combat, myth marathon ect ect. Plus there is the more shortsighted actions as killing there sucessful first party studios that they brought then axed.

 

But hey instead change the boundries of your argument and bring up your facination or distraction with plushophilia, that's always pertinant in your dealing with the world I'm sure.

 

Benevolent? Microsoft is benevolent? Huh? But as a correction, Close Combat was also published by SSI and Mech Warrior games are still being made. Myth is I.P. owned by Take two and Marathon was self published by Bungie themselves.

In any case I will repeat.

There are both pros and cons for both strategies of pushing exclusivity. Microsoft generally does not take control over the work of a developer. So once the 6-12 months are up the game developer is free to to whatever they want with the I.P. and infact it may lead to a better result for the game developer because it may put them in the position to control their own I.P. which is very important to a lot of companies. Sony on the other hand does, so any smaller time I.P. they get their hands on from anything they published can tend to die once they lose interest. That means if you love a game series, the chance of it continuing under Sony are smaller than Microsoft overall because the developers have fewer options. I personally believe that the control over I.P. should be in the hands of the people who love the I.P. and not some large multinational.

P.S. Ensemble closed down but the two teams which made up Ensemble are not dead. Infact this is one of the better results because these two companies are now free and they can be much more effective than they were at Ensemble.