Finally Congress does something right.

Sony probably moneyhatted a ton of exclusives in the PS1 and PS2 eras which was a continuation to what Nintendo and others did in the previous generations, a standard industry practice that perhaps got worse due to PS1 and PS2's sheer dominance (and superior hardware design in PS1's case). But the vast majority of PS1/PS2 exclusives weren't "moneyhatted". The dominant platform gets a lot of free support without the platform holder necessarily paying anythng. And porting was a more complicated process back then.

Since the PS360 era, notable exclusive deals became less and less common until eventually even Japanese PC support grew to easily rival Playstation's. Knowledge is now accessible by everyone thanks to the internet, engines are easy to use and scalable, architectures don't vary much, and porting job is very simple.

ARK sold millions on Playstation and Valheim has the potential to sell millions as well. The titles themselves are big and growing, much bigger than Ghostwire and Deathloop. But if you're gonna play the "but it doesn't sell much on [insert platform]" card, then this makes Sony's moneyhatting more justifiable/less important. Even Monster Hunter World only cracked 2 million on Xbox next to 9-12 million on PC and PS4 each. So if you're basing an exclusivity deal's damage/relevance on how much it sells on a platform rather than the IP's own significance, that would put MS in a more negative light because ALL relevant games sell much better on Playstation than Xbox. ARK2 and Valheim >>> Ghostwire and Deathloop no matter how you slice it. A better argument can be made for Microsoft is that the exclusivity period is typically shorter.

I didn't mean to say you were blaming acquisitions on Sony, but a lot of people did and still do. Shikamaru, the OP, often blamed Micosoft's acquisitions on Sony's moneyhatting. The uncomplicated truth is Microsoft's acquisitions are not related to Sony's exclusivity deals which hardly have an impact on Xbox, but congress toddlers are throwing a tantrum about it. Imagine having the gall to criticize Sony's meager deals in light of MS acquiring Mojang/Zenimax/ABK. What I see is Microsoft being rewarded for incompetence, and Sony penalized for competence.

I'm not interested in talking "business".. anything goes in business, and Microsoft with its infinite resources is definitely kicking Sony's ass right now because once ABK is acquired, they will be a considerably bigger player in gaming than Sony and Nintendo, while still pretending to be as a small player in their adventure to acquire major publishers and studios. Hopefully they will fail next time. As I already mentioned, ABK makes similar profits to the entire Playstation division. Why does no one talk about this? Why is gaming now reduced to just "hardware marketshare" following the countless times Microsoft downplayed this metric?

You know Ghostwire and Deathloop were made by smaller (less important) developers within the Bethesda group (not the TES/Fallout devs lol) and sold a fraction of Valheim and ARK2. And they don't chart anywhere even during sale (Ghostwire is currently at $34 AUD on the Playstation Store). Valheim and ARK 2 should be many times bigger and sell 20/30 million+ easy. They're more than 10 times bigger in some metrics, and less in other metrics. You seem offended for no reason whatsoever. I shouldn't have lumped in Ghostwire with Deathloop though, because the latter is notably bigger (but still many times smaller than the aforementioned).

Machiavellian didn't blame Sony and I never said he did. "Sony's fault" is a general argument that exists among Microsoft's fans who keep justifying the acquisitions using the Sony's moneyhatting excuse. Playstation's dominance from the PS4 onwards owes very little to paid exclusives, which virtually have no impact on Xbox.

It's not Sony's fault that Microsoft is incompetent. It's not Sony's fault that Microsoft decided to make Xbox redundant by shipping all of their games day and date on PC thereby losing console marketshare. It's not Sony's fault that they overestimated the Series S and can't produce enough Series X units. Microsoft's decisions and mismanagement are their fault and theirs alone. Going broader inherently hurts Xbox's sales potential, and yet Sony has to pay for it, it's laughable. Let me clarify again than I'm not saying YOU or Machiavellian are personally blaming Sony for it, but it's a rather common sentiment from acquisition cheerleaders.

"Exclusivity deals just don't act the same when your already the market leader by a huge margin"

Not sure I understand you here. Are you saying it's worse when a marketleader does deals even though they will impact far fewer players?

There are no ethics in business, but I would have liked to see some consistency from those whining about Sony's exclusivity deals. Microsoft's acquisition are disproportionate and potentially destructive... and they're also clearly not stopping them from moneyhatting pretty big games as like Valheim and ARK 2, which as you pointed out are more recent.

Exclusivity deals in the old days were a lot more substantial because old systems, especially Sony's, had very high quantities of relevant and system selling 3rd party exclusives. That is no longer the case with modern platforms where most gamers have access to the majority of relevant 3rd party games that sell systems (Compare PS1/PS2's best sellers to PS4's. PS4 is dominated by multiplats and 1st party titles. 3rd party exclusives are very few and don't rank high, meaning: "Moneyhatting is hardly relevant").

Microsoft's acquisitions may eventually lead to dozens of big titles skipping a major platform and a massive playerbase needlessly (Starfield is the beginning). Some of you keep assuming that Sony won't be able to respond, but you are wrong. They will respond to the best of their ability, and they will take more games from Xbox fans starting with Bungie's at some point (Their first "fucked up" acquisition. Sony will not doubt pull Bungie games out of Xbox once Microsoft pulls CoD out of Playstation. Yay!). A lot of fanboys are cheering for potentially hundreds of billions wasted just to have games locked on their preferred platform, most of which would have been there regardless, just not as exclusives. This unprecedented development would be Microsoft's fault. Sure, it's within their right as a company but why should I give a fuck? All I see is mountains of cash burnt only for games to sell less. It's a loss-loss.

I actively criticized Sony for their more obvious moneyhatting. But Micrososft is doing it several times worse (counting major acquisitions), and it isn't really a response to Sony's paid exclusives, but rather as a response to Playstation's well earned dominance. They are literally being rewarded for incompetence and I'm supposed to keep a straight face about it or risk offending people.

You know Ghostwire and Deathloop were made by smaller (less important) developers within the Bethesda group (not the TES/Fallout devs lol) and sold a fraction of Valheim and ARK2.

You know Sony didn't make a deals with Tango Gameworks nor Arkane Lyon they made deals with Bethesda. And Ark 2 is not released yet so no sells and despite the fact Ark is available on all platforms the vast majority of sales are still PC and there's absolutely no guarantee Valheim with be that of a success on Console. There's a reason both dev target GamePass on day one. The first ark did the very same deals releasing on both steam and Xbox before releasing on all other in 2017, do we even know if PlayStation policy's even allow public pre-release/alpha on their consoles. By the way, I was not offended at all, I just used your very own lexicon on purpose in my argument the show the irony between what you state as your motive and your own claim.

Machiavellian didn't blame Sony and I never said he did. "Sony's fault" is a general argument that exists among Microsoft's fans who keep justifying the acquisitions using the Sony's moneyhatting excuse. 

That's the weird part you argue people that are not arguing you right now and you don't quote them either, it looks like you use console warring views/opinions from some MS fans to justify your own opposite console warring views/opinions. You want to focus on the gamers' reaction, but there's no way to do this without devolving into partisan warfare, looking at this as a business decision and by it's business implication is the only way to looks at things while making abstraction of one's own opinion/bias/preference.

Playstation's dominance from the PS4 onwards owes very little to paid exclusives, which virtually have no impact on Xbox.

Xbox monumental Xbox one screw up sure is a major factor in the PS4 dominance. However, saying paid exclusive is only of marginal effects run very much against their widespread use. If Sony determined they had only marginal impact they would simply not be using these, but they do. It's not wrong/bad to do so either, I wish MS were still using these like they did during the first half of the 360 gen but they don't and that's not wrong either.  

It's not Sony's fault that Microsoft is incompetent. It's not Sony's fault that Microsoft decided to make Xbox redundant by shipping all of their games day and date on PC thereby losing console marketshare. It's not Sony's fault that they overestimated the Series S and can't produce enough Series X units. Microsoft's decisions and mismanagement are their fault and theirs alone. Going broader inherently hurts Xbox's sales potential, and yet Sony has to pay for it, it's laughable. Let me clarify again than I'm not saying YOU or Machiavellian are personally blaming Sony for it, but it's a rather common sentiment from acquisition cheerleaders.

Sony does not have to pay for MS mismanagement nor is Microsoft trying to do that, MS is simply upping their game fueled by renewed faith in Xbox due to GamePass and perceived necessity to act fast and strong. It is in no way an attack on Sony nor is it an attack on Sony's fan, those are just console warring points of views.

Not sure I understand you here. Are you saying it's worse when a marketleader does deals even though they will impact far fewer players?

Not at all, I'm saying cost of making these are reduced by their positions and impact they have are only magnified by such. However your sentencing let me believe you view action from one as more ethical because having a bigger fan base makes the negatives aspect felt by less populated group?  

There are no ethics in business, but I would have liked to see some consistency from those whining about Sony's exclusivity deals.

Whiners gonna whine, hatters gonna hate there's no way around it, simply ignore them or actually argue with them but it serve no purpose to argue them on conversation that don't support their views.

Microsoft's acquisition are disproportionate and potentially destructive.

By what metrics?

And they're also clearly not stopping them from moneyhatting pretty big games as like Valheim and ARK 2, which as you pointed out are more recent.

Why should they?

Exclusivity deals in the old days were a lot more substantial because old systems, especially Sony's, had very high quantities of relevant and system selling 3rd party exclusives. That is no longer the case with modern platforms where most gamers have access to the majority of relevant 3rd party games that sell systems (Compare PS1/PS2's best sellers to PS4's. PS4 is dominated by multiplats and 1st party titles. 3rd party exclusives are very few and don't rank high, meaning: "Moneyhatting is hardly relevant").

If your arguments were accurate, then it make no sense such deals will still be used today at all.

Microsoft's acquisitions may eventually lead to dozens of big titles skipping a major platform and a massive playerbase needlessly (Starfield is the beginning).

Are any other acquisition different? To my knowledge only one acquisition by one of the big 3 was counter to this rule and it was Mojang acquisition by Microsoft.

Some of you keep assuming that Sony won't be able to respond, but you are wrong. They will respond to the best of their ability, and they will take more games from Xbox fans starting with Bungie's at some point (Their first "fucked up" acquisition. Sony will not doubt pull Bungie games out of Xbox once Microsoft pulls CoD out of Playstation. Yay!).

We agree, I fully expect Sony to respond and fully support any of there acquisition initiative. Thought I would find funny if they try a major one only to see their very own argument to counter this acquisition by MS used against them. Just like it is with this thread context. I will also find many argument from both side to be funny for sure. But that's the things, take a moment, take a step back, make some popcorn and enjoy the show. 

A lot of fanboys are cheering for potentially hundreds of billions wasted just to have games locked on their preferred platform, most of which would have been there regardless, just not as exclusives. This unprecedented development would be Microsoft's fault. Sure, it's within their right as a company but why should I give a fuck? All I see is mountains of cash burnt only for games to sell less. It's a loss-loss.

There's nothing unprecedented in this, the video game industry see acquisition every year and their have been wave of large swats of acquisitions before. ABK themselves is just a collection of acquisition and so are every other major player in the industry.

I actively criticized Sony for their more obvious moneyhatting. But Micrososft is doing it several times worse (counting major acquisitions), and it isn't really a response to Sony's paid exclusives, but rather as a response to Playstation's well earned dominance. They are literally being rewarded for incompetence and I'm supposed to keep a straight face about it or risk offending people.

And that's only cause recent event run against what you view as the model the gaming industry should follow. What you view as worse is another neutral or best, what you view as well earned dominance might be viewed as other unethically achieved one, what you view as incompetence can be seen otherwise by others. 

You know Sony didn't make a deals with Tango Gameworks nor Arkane Lyon they made deals with Bethesda

Who cares about the parent company? the games/studios aren't relevant. Their rankings among Playstation software sales will decide their true worth, simple as that.

That's the weird part you argue people that are not arguing you right now and you don't quote them either.

They were and still are arguing this all the time. This thread tells a story about the congressmen trying to kill exclusivity deals in Japan like they're the cause of Sony's dominance there (omega LOL) while giving Microsoft a free pass to make industry shaking moves. More over, it's posted by Shikamaru who often blamed MS's acquisitions on Sony's moneyhatting. It's a standard opinion among Microsoft's fans, not just fanboys/haters. So it's very much relevant.

Xbox monumental Xbox one screw up sure is a major factor in the PS4 dominance. However, saying paid exclusive is only of marginal effects run very much against their widespread use. If Sony determined they had only marginal impact they would simply not be using these, but they do.

Exclulsives are generally a small but welcome addition to the console's value and brand power/sustainability, hence everyone including Microsoft does it. But they do not explain the ridiculous response from Microsoft. Microsoft's unprecedented acquisitions (and yes, they are obviously unprecedented) is the result of their incompetence vs intention to dominate gaming. Spin it all you want but it's the truth.

Sony does not have to pay for MS mismanagement nor is Microsoft trying to do that, MS is simply upping their game fueled by renewed faith in Xbox due to GamePass and perceived necessity to act fast and strong. It is in no way an attack on Sony nor is it an attack on Sony's fan, those are just console warring points of views.

Sony is factually paying for it! Xbox's weak position in the market is what's seemingly enabling these acquisitions to come to pass. The weak position is primarily the result of Micosoft's own choices and mismanagement, and yet Sony and their playerbase are paying for it because Mojang/Zenimax/ABK and god knows who else may all skip Playstation in the future.

By what metrics?

You're actually unironically asking this...

1. Hundreds of billions wasted on games you're getting anyways. They could have been spent on talents/developers that actually need it to create dozens of new experiences. A very few people stand to gain from an acquisition war between platform holders.

2. Reliance on massive established franchises could reduce Microsoft's incentive to innovate, and might damage their old flagship titles which may not be a priority anymore.

3. A huge increase in major exclusives mean a lot of people have to spend more to just gain access to titles they had accessed for years. We'll be spending more for little to no real gains. Only Game Pass subscribers stand to gain something from this. But Game Pass subscribers are a minority of gamers, and Microsoft could have easily paid to get any game they wanted on Game Pass day 1. With that said, acquisitions do make more business sense than the alternative with the long term benefit in mind.

If your arguments were accurate, then it make no sense such deals will still be used today at all.

All exclusives "matter", but not nearly as much as it's often suggested. 3rd party exclusives weren't major system sellers on PS4. 1st party exclusives are far bigger, and major multiplats are even bigger than those.

Sony's 1st party software sell many times more than their biggest paid exclusives. Microsoft's acquisition craze threatens to take away the multiplats that sell even better on Playstation than Sony's own games. Sony only paid for a bunch of exclusives the best of which would barely crack 1 or 2 million lifetime on Xbox. CoD alone sells well over 10 million annually on Playstation. So if someone wasn't happy about Sony's approach out of principle (as opposed to tribalism), then they shouldn't be happy with MS doing it worse.

If you think FF7R, Persona 5, and Forespoken being on Xbox on day 1 would have changed the marketshare by more than 0.1%, then you would be wrong. Aside from maybe Final Fantasy, their marketshare impact just isn't all that different from Cuphead or Tunic skipping Playstation for a period of time. And many of those exclusives have overlapping fanbases.

Are any other acquisition different? To my knowledge only one acquisition by one of the big 3 was counter to this rule and it was Mojang acquisition by Microsoft.

Platform holder acquisitions are generally not different. Hence why they should be opposed by gamers who consider themselves impartial. Bungie and Mojang continue to support Xbox and Playstation, but don't expect this to remain that way forever.

Smaller acquisitions are fine. No one complained about any acquisition MS made that wasn't Bethesda/ABK (Mojang warrants criticism but they kept Minecraft on PS so it's good "so far"). Smaller acquisitions will not harm several millions of gamers (especially not 2nd party acquisitions) and often help to increase the size, productivity, and quality of the studio. Countless small/mid sized developers would benefit from big publishers acquiring them, so I support this when it's done right (Done right = growth in popularity, quality, staff, etc).

We agree, I fully expect Sony to respond and fully support any of there acquisition initiative.

I find it sad that the situation has gotten bad to the point of making it acceptable to fully support such a response from Sony, which as you said could only escalate to even worse developments. MS could use that against them to justify another major acquisition. Sony needs better lawyers lol. I honestly think the best realistic scenario is for Amazon and Google to step in, because the odds are they'll keep the games multiplatform.

There's nothing unprecedented in this, the video game industry see acquisition every year and their have been wave of large swats of acquisitions before. ABK themselves is just a collection of acquisition and so are every other major player in the industry.

A platform holder spending well over $80 billion to acquire one major publisher after the other is an unprecedented development. The amounts of money they're spending is representative of the magnitude.

And that's only cause recent event run against what you view as the model the gaming industry should follow. What you view as worse is another neutral or best, what you view as well earned dominance might be viewed as other unethically achieved one, what you view as incompetence can be seen otherwise by others.

I criticized Sony's moneyhats long before MS went ham with acquisitions. And let's not spin undisputed facts as "views".

It's not my "view" that Xbox's 1st/2nd party growth is poor compared to Sony's.
It's not my view that Playstation's 3rd party exclusives represent a tiny portion of Playstation's best sellers, and don't rank high.
It's not my view that the underpowered Series S is selling poorly and Series X is in limited quantities.

Game Pass aside, Microsoft underdelivered and they're trying to remedy their mistakes and weaknesses using bruteforce. I rest my case.

Of course Microsofts acquisitions are much bigger, they have a lot more money. Just because Sony can’t afford to buy Mojang or Bethesda or ABK when those companies want to sell, doesn’t make it wrong for MS to buy them. Maybe if Sonys other businesses were doing better, they’d fare better in the acquisition wars.

It’s the same situation as the games Sony moneyhats or buys exclusive content for, they are much bigger than the games MS can buy, and happen much more frequently. You won’t see MS buying games like SFV or FF7 or FF-whatever the new one is or Fartspooken etc, or getting exclusive content in games like Hogwarts because the difference in install base makes those deals way too expensive to be worth it for MS. And that’s their own fault. Back when the 360 was competing with the PS3, MS was much more aggressive with these deals because the market allowed them to be. When the Xbone launched and the effects of their horrid Xbone marketing and reveal weren’t yet being felt, they were able to be aggressive with these kinds of deals.

Now MS finds themselves in a place where lots of companies are buying up publishers and studios and the market doesn’t allow them to make the types of deals Sony can make without dramatically overspending. The last time they tried a deal like that, I could be wrong but didn’t they have to spend $100,000,000 to get Tomb Raider for a year? I see a lot of people say “well MS could just use those billions to pay for exclusives or hire new talent”, but neither of those are based in reality.

Just because MS can lay out 70B to buy something like ABK, which is an investment that would see gargantuan returns, doesn’t mean they also can lay out that 70B to moneyhat games or “HiRe TaLeNt” as if great devs just grow on trees. To put it another way, imagine you’re a parent and your child wants a $500 laptop for schoolwork and other stuff. You decide to buy it, then they ask for a PS5 or SX instead. Well, you already decided you would spend $500 on a laptop for school and such, you can just spend that on a gaming console instead, right? It doesn’t make any sense.

I also have to laugh at whoever said the acquisitions could make MS less innovative. Yes, because Nintendo and Sony have been incredibly innovative. Also, the studios MS has bought so far, have mostly pu led out great games and new IPs. It hasn’t resulted in any less innovation yet.

That is some expensive self-pity and whining by MS. 

The average voter is clearly deeply troubled by the xbox failures in Japan. The state of our politics.... 

You do realise that those donations are made by individuals and not the company right? The donators just have to declare who they work for.

"Individuals"

Meaning $524,068 came from individuals who work at Microsoft. This is nothing, it is completely normal, if I moved to America and joined Microsoft then donated to her then I would increase that total and this total is over a 31 year period, Lol. People really need to stop using this to go after her because they are all reading it completely wrong.

She's a Washington Senator as well so naturally she will have a lot of employees who work at Microsoft donating to her because Microsoft is a Washington based company who employee nearly 50,000 in Washington alone. She was likely lobbied (although no evidence of financial transaction yet) by Microsoft or someone close to them who planted these seeds, it makes sense, she is a Washington Senator and Microsoft is a Washington company but literally every single company in the world lobbies, including Sony.

I want to make clear though that Microsoft did not donate $524k to her, as some are reading this and using as an excuse to go after her.

Yeah and? 

These 11 congressmen didn't wake up one day and decided it's time to fix the gaming industry behaviours in Japan because their representatives have voiced concerns about the Xbox situation in Japan. It's all to do with lobbying.

I am not "going after her". I am making fun of the state of western democracies because literally every single company in the world lobbies. 

Sure...You can make fun of lobbying.

But what was the point in the image? Lol.