They just shared some of their knowledge and gave technical support for free. I think that Sony is against the policy of paying something for extra contents or timed exclusives.

Depends on your definition of "paying".

It's more likely they're giving discounts on their liscenses.

It's the same reason there is only ever Pepsi OR Coke at a Restruant.

They don't pay for exclusivity, so much as make it a lot cheaper to give them the benefit.

Oh... this explains the other thread.

Though no... they aren't. 

All they've ever done is occasionally take shots and MS for having more overt "paying" for exclusives.

IE offering real money, vs discounts on liscensing fees, advertising support and the like.

Sony has been buying exclusives since FF7.

I'd... mostly agree.  I don't know though.  Kratos is a perfect fit... yet it feels odd that they would just 1-side it like that with no benefit.  Espeically since Mocapping still isn't that cheap is it?

Why risk antagonizing 360 fans for nothing.  I'm sure the benefit was small, but they surely got something....

or just have trouble with MS making finding an exclusive char for them... which as weird as MS can be could be a possibility.

For sure they didn't buy FF7. Besides the fact that it was ported to pc, at the time the only capable console for such a game was the playstation.

They paid to keep GTA off the Xbox for years.

Because Microsoft stopped to pay publishers.

well iirc the 360 version did get some stuff like an exclusive arena and some mode that I can't remember off the top of my head, if it was paid for I'd expect the 360 version to not get jack diddly shit in compensation like with Batman AA.  Mostly I think that it was just like Soul Caliber (sp) except that the MK guys didn't want to go with something generic like Spawn for the 360 version.  There really isn't an easy first party character that fits into MK except for the more obscure like Killer Instinct but perhaps the MK guys didn't want to help bring back one of their direct competitors, and so you're at a standstill.  So PS3 gets Kratos because it fits perfectly and Sony has all the rights over him, and 360 gets some other stuff because there really isn't an easy fit among MS IP's.

What other stuff did the 360 version get? It never got a demo like the PS3 did, which makes it all the more likely that Sony paid them to include Kratos and keep a demo off the 360 (which, the fact that the 360 doesn't have a demo is still incredibly lame and is a reason I haven't bought it, but that's not really my point).

EDIT: Is that stuff confirmed? I thought the 360 version got zilch in comparison.

Hmm....seems I can only find it as a rumor, talked to Machina and he does not recall a mode like the rumors or an extra arena.  Coupled with the exclusive demo that I forgot about and yeah, seems likely Sony paid for that one as well.