One thing I will never understand is why Microsoft, one of the richest and most profitable company in the world, was willing to let go and closed of studios (Bungie, Esemble, and letting Bioware go to EA), having an enemic first party and relies mostly on timed exclusives (cough..Ninja Gaiden...Star Ocean 4, Bioshock, Mass Effect ???), and recently letting Sony and Nintendo kicking them in the tooth in sale in both Japan and EU, isn't willing to use some of Bill Gate's pocket change laying around in his sofa somewhere and buy a large publisher like EA and/or Square ENIX?

Think about this for a second. Having rights to Madden, Fifa, Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest certainly guarantee victory in this generation and future generations in all regions.

And to think Microsft was willing to hand over 40 billions to try to buy Yahoo a year ago. I just don't get it. Can somebody help me out here?

Because they're not stupid (no offense)

When you can answer the question below, then you've answered your question.

M$ has a lot of money, why weren't they able to afford Yahoo?

you should ask Nintendo not MS. Theyre the one thats rich right now.

1) Most of EA's licensed games are liscend to EA under the condition that they release them for all viable platforms

2) EA is running at a loss, SE making some profit. If they were forced to stop making games except for the 360 then they would lose so much money. EA requires the Wii as a cash cow, SE requires the DS

because those companies earn more profit being independent ?

Because buying a company isn't like buying something in the store, if I recall, for a company to be "bought", 51% of the shareholders need to be willing to sell their share of the company, and there are a lot of pepole who won't do that.

Microsoft's share price has been flat since the 90s and Baller's head is on the line right now. It should be obvious that they aren't willing to tolerate further losses from the xbox division at the moment.

Because:

1) That would cost too much money for too little gain.

2) As RageBot said, 51% of the shareholders need to be willing to sell. If they're willing to sell, stock price is probably going down. If stock prices are going down, you don't want to buy the company.

3) Correct me if I'm wrong, but is that even legal? Wouldn't it be classified as anti-competitive? I mean, if Microsoft isn't even allowed to only include their own BROWSER in THEIR operating system...

Considering the entertainment division profited for a second year in a row, what they are doing might be right on track and they shouldn't stray from it. As consumers of course we would want more but for Microsoft this comes as a significant risk.