For me it's really the turn based part that I can't get over as I also enjoy a fair bit of micromanagement myself. I've sunk countless hours into games like Banished, rimworld, factorio... But idk when it is a turn based RPG just can't get over it. But I really love rpg like the Tale of series.

"providing CoD on PS Plus at a commercially unviable price"

uhm...it's CoD. Obviously, if you want to have the same perk of providing it day 1 in your subscription service...it's going to cost a fuckton of money.

It’s not as if Sony has had 13yrs to make PS+ the dominate sub service, they’ve only themselves to blame.

Exactly.

Not even Microsoft was willing to pay that amount.

Just because CoD comes under Microsoft shouldn't mean Sony gets special treatment in the costs.

Sony is acting like Microsoft is getting CoD for free, they aren't, they are spending $69bn.

At this stage I wouldn't be surprised if Sony asks for it for free.

4J Studios

4J Studios is an SME Independent Games developer based in Dundee and East Linton. Our company has had a working relationship with the games division of Microsoft for over fifteen years. We have developed several games for Microsoft directly including Perfect Dark, Banjo Kazooie and Banjo Tooie all for the Xbox 360. Microsoft were also responsible for introducing us to Mojang AB which ultimately led to us becoming the developer of Minecraft Console Editions on Xbox 360, PlayStation Vita, PlayStation 3, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Nintendo WiiU and Nintendo Switch

We have been in a fairly unique position of working as a partner with Microsoft and also as a partner of a company which was acquired by Microsoft during our tenure as the party responsible for the console development of Minecraft. We had a period of transition from the ownership of Mojang AB from its original shareholders to the current position where it is wholly owned by Microsoft. During that period, which lasted several years, Microsoft has honoured every element of the agreements that they inherited and also extended our relationship significantly to cover new formats, like Nintendo Switch, as well as many other content enhancements

During the phase of Microsoft ownership we have never been under any pressure to favour Microsoft owned formats, indeed we were actively encouraged by Microsoft to develop unique content such as the “Mario Mash Up” pack for Nintendo formats. Microsoft have also brought significant stability and rigour to our contractual and commercial relationships and have been both fair and professional in all our dealings with them

The games industry is now the world’s largest entertainment industry and, as such, it is inevitable that companies like Microsoft need to gain access to more content and talent to justify their continued investment into large scale hardware platforms such as Xbox

We do not see the proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard as anything other than a natural evolution of the industry and it does not give us any cause for concern for our own future opportunities.

Market Participant B

We are pleased to offer the following observations on Microsoft's proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard in response to the provisional findings and notice of possible remedies published by the CMA on 8 February 2023.

We believe that consumers' tastes and preferences in the video game space cut across a broad array of games and a wide variety of genres and platforms. As such, we do not believe that any title can be considered a "must have" in the interactive entertainment market. In the context of this dynamic, and considering Microsoft's stated commitment to make certain games available on all platforms, we do not believe the proposed transaction will negatively impact consumers.

Market Participant C

I am the CEO of an independent game developer having worked with most of the top game publishers including Sony, Microsoft and Activision.

I wish to express a couple of points regarding the Microsoft Activision merger and possible remedies listed

1. Trustworthiness of Microsoft

In my experience dealing with them over the last 25 years, Microsoft always honor their contracts and obligations. When they say that they intend to make Call of Duty content available on Sony and Nintendo platforms, I believe them and I believe it is in their interest as well as the interest of the industry

2. Inevitability of consolidation in favor of cloud-based platforms

In my view the potential of direct distribution of content to consumers through the cloud is giving an inevitable advantage to the cloud-based platforms over the traditional publishers. While the Microsoft Activision merger looks to be the largest to date, other similar consolidation is likely to happen as other publishers realize that their business has to evolve because consumers prefer to purchase games directly from online platforms giving them access to a larger catalogue. To build a stronger catalogue, other platforms also aspire to acquire publishers and developers : such consolidation is a natural evolution of the business and does not necessarily constitute SLCs

3. Competition from China

China-based giant Tencent is already an investor in Activision. If Microsoft is prevented from acquiring Activision, would the UK consumers be better served if they were acquired by Tencent instead ? Chinese publishers in our industry benefit from an unfair advantage due to the fact that the China market is closed to Western companies through various regulations while Chinese companies can freely access the Western markets. Letting Microsoft and Activision consolidate their business in light of this fast-growing competition would not be against the interest of UK consumers

Market Participant D

Disclaimer: We would like to present our opinion anonymously.

The opinion is presented from the perspective of a developer and a publisher of AAA titles whose games are distributed on all major consoles (Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo), PC and mobile.

We are of the opinion that it is difficult to predict exact effects of the anticipated acquisition by Microsoft Corporation ("Microsoft") of Activision-Blizzard, Inc. ("Activision") (the "Merger"), in particular due to the complexity of the video game industry and diversity of Microsoft’s own business operations. We do not, however, expect any significant impact of the Merger on our company nor distribution of our own products. In particular, we do not expect the Merger to pose any risks to the distribution of our own games on Xbox or other consoles.

Market Participant E

I felt compelled to get in touch regarding the CMA's notice of possible remedies in the Activision Blizzard acquisition case.

Our business primarily focuses on releasing video games for various gaming platforms, including both Xbox and PlayStation. In recent years, we've found that our video game sales across Xbox and PlayStation have been moving in different directions, mainly due to the structure of how each platform is laid out.

On PlayStation, we've found our sales growing stagnant with each release. This is mainly due to the fact that, despite PlayStation having the lion's share of player numbers and console sales, that share is mainly provided to larger titles from huge publishing labels, and/or developers and publishers who are willing to spend lots of money on paid marketing within the PlayStation console. This means that on PlayStation, it simply isn't a level playing field for every publisher and developer. It has meant that as the years have gone by, if you put a smaller titles on PlayStation devices now, your title will rarely appear organically to PlayStation players. Instead, you are 100% reliant on players knowing about your game already, and searching for it on the store.

On Xbox, the opposite has come true over the last several years. There are numerous means of players finding your game on Xbox, including in special sections on the store, and through the Xbox Game Pass service. As a result, we've found that, despite Xbox having much smaller player numbers and console sales than PlayStation, our games sell just as well on Xbox, since more players are finding our games there. We usually find that the revenue we now make from new games, is more on Xbox than PlayStation due to this fact -- again, despite Xbox being the smaller platform in many ways.

We've found that, whenever there is large public buzz around Xbox, there are more Xbox hardware sales, and as a result we see even better ongoing results on Xbox. With this in mind, I've found myself of the opinion that the acquisition of Activision Blizzard can only be a good thing for smaller-to-mid sized business like ours, as it will no doubt lead to increased sales of Xbox hardware, increased subscriber numbers on the Xbox Game Pass subscription service, and thus, larger sales for businesses like ours on Xbox. Coupled with the fact that Xbox has a better ecosystem currently for players to discover new games, I can only see the acquisition being a positive for a lot of businesses like ours.

The acquisition will not all of a sudden make Xbox the dominant platform. It's far more likely that it may help to create a more level playing field between Xbox and PlayStation which, at this point in time, is sorely needed. PlayStation needs better competition, to force the platform to up its game, and this will surely help to do that

Market Participant F

We decided to take the opportunity to express our support of the MS acquisition of Activision/Blizzard in this mail.

There are two main reasons for why we felt compelled to do so.

1. We honestly found the arguments against this acquisition to be slightly exaggerated and out of proportion. We are worried that actual real competition and more innovative consumer friendly initiatives, could be potentially hindered by blocking this, by potential market leaders/competitors, who might not be ready or might believe in a different strategy, or just not compelled to change their status quo on the market.

2. While we do not want to point fingers at anyone's struggle to create and maintain a good culture for employees, as this is challenging for any company and has always been, we do see that a change in "scenery" with a new home at MS might be good for some of our colleague's working in the studios on the various projects

Redfall - Official Story Trailer - YouTube

Those are some serious supports in favor of the merger. If there is any group of opinions should be taken seriously, it's game developers. Any studio that didn't remain anonymous better be prepared for a triple dose of console warring hitting their twitter.

Even Tencent is in favour of the deal, Lol.

It really does seem to be just Sony and Google.

Some Snippets From Microsoft's Response.

Microsoft has no intention of withholding CoD from PlayStation. Its recent actions clearly demonstrate that its incentives are to widen distribution of CoD on consoles (as well as other devices). In present value terms, anticipated future revenues from CoD on PlayStation account for approximately []% (~$[]) of the overall value of the deal for Microsoft. A withholding strategy would involve immediately forgoing this substantial revenue stream, []. Yet the CMA is unable to point to a single piece of evidence to suggest that Microsoft has even considered such a strategy, let alone plans to pursue it. That is because no such evidence exists.

Nor can the CMA place reliance on Microsoft's "past behaviour" following acquisitions of smaller studios/publishers to question the clearly articulated strategy in relation to this deal. Minecraft remains the closest analogue to CoD in terms of Microsoft's previous acquisition. Minecraft has remained on all platforms post-acquisition, in addition to being made available on many new platforms, including Nintendo. This is entirely consistent with the strategy Microsoft has repeatedly set out in relation to this Merger.

The Provisional Findings also fail to take account of a key difference between this Merger and previous Microsoft gaming deals. Here, unlike in previous acquisitions, Microsoft senior leadership has publicly committed to making a specific game, CoD, available on other platforms. This did not occur in ZeniMax, nor in any other deal flagged by the CMA.

In addition, its first-party library is supported by a portfolio of high-quality exclusive third-party content. Sony also has exclusive agreements for many of the most highly anticipated third-party releases in 2023, such as Final Fantasy XVI and Forspoken both from Square Enix, with whom Sony has a decades-long relationship. Industry commentators note that Sony is "the dominant platform that publishers like Square Enix simply can't afford to ignore". Sony could easily retaliate if Microsoft were to make CoD exclusive post-Merger, including by making more popular games exclusive to PlayStation.

Think Microsoft Found Their Argument for CAT.