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Forums - Gaming Discussion - Why Do People View the MS Acquisition of ABK as a "Good Thing?"

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Ryuu96 said:

Appreciate the fair response. 👍

I guess we differ simply in that we don't have the same future fears, for the reasons I've stated, I believe the gaming market is more protected against that level of consolidation but that's fine, I can't really debate a future with proof

For me, I'm of course against some acquisitions and wouldn't like to see a massive consolidation but I just don't have the fear of that happening. Do I think more will happen? Sure, but I still don't think it's going to come down to like 3-5 companies owning practically everything, again for the reasons I stated in my previous post.

I think each acquisition should be judged on its individual merits and not a possibility future because then it makes it difficult to know where to cut things off, it's also not really fair (Imo) to block an acquisition on the basis that some others in the future may consolidate the industry even if you slow down and even if your specific acquisition right now is perfectly legal and doesn't significantly harm consumers or competition.

Judging the ABK acquisition on its merits, it has been deemed to be more pro-consumer than not, more pro-competition than not, doesn't give Microsoft a huge advantage over the competition. ABK is largely about Mobile for Microsoft as well. In the year ending 2021, Mobile accounted for 36% of ABK's revenues, in the year ending 2022, Mobile accounted for 47% of ABK's revenues. Microsoft has next to zero foothold in Mobile and ABK without Mobile would be a much less expensive company as well. Microsoft is more concerned about Mobile than Xbox exclusivity, Lol.

Yeah, I'm a little concerned about outside companies as well but Google dipped out the moment they realised it would be expensive, as per usual with Google who don't commit to anything new. xCloud is a failure for Xbox so far but at least they're sticking with it, Lol. There are others who are still lurking though like Amazon, oh I forgot to mention Netflix as well.

But these guys are just seeing the facts, irrelevant of Microsoft's acquisitions, the Gaming Industry is a massive business now, it's one of the largest entertainment sectors, there are studies saying it's bigger than film and music combined, it's rapidly growing as well, but the silver lining maybe is that a large portion of that growth comes from mobile while console has a lower ceiling so maybe they just focus on mobile.

Yeah, the FTC did a terrible job, I think it wouldn't have mattered how long they had though, they were always arguing from a tough position, I wish they'd use these resources on actually winnable cases, it's like them taking Meta to court earlier this year for acquiring a VR Fitness Start-up Company that nobody had ever heard of...They lost...Again...I'm not against FTC going after certain companies but actually pick good ones, make good cases, stop wasting your limited resources, especially with a Supreme Court desperate for an excuse to stamp on your neck...

of course! the point of my thread was never to vehemently argue i am right and everyone else is wrong. i know that i didn't know 100% of the story here so, i appreciate you and others offering concise (and civil lol) reasonings for the pro-side.

basically though, yeah... i think we have different assumptions and fears and maybe view the corporate and legal world slightly differently. i still believe it's possible that this could lead to furthering down a detrimental road but, i can concede this isn't the only reason that could happen nor is it good enough reason for the court to stop this. for me though, "too little, too late" is not a good enough reason and i think it would be better to stop corporations getting to big by any means. again though, that's more political and possibly a little too naive haha. we both obviously can't predict exactly what will happen, so i guess we'll see!

definitely these outside players could've and basically have already tried making moves, MS acquisition or not. not even mentioning players such as Saudi Arabia... sheesh.

the FTC have honestly screwed themselves. if they continue to take on ridiculous cases, no company will be scared of them and their authority. i'm not surprised though, in the political climate we're in especially - corporations are gods. late-stage capitalism baby. 



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PotentHerbs said:
EpicRandy said:

People's opinions and beliefs, you can find people in about any groups you can come up with that thinks the earth is flat, but it does not make it so. 

Yes some Nintendo fans are against it, and I'm sure even some Xbox fans are against it, but ask why and you find very little substance to the position, it mostly boils down to generalist big transaction = bad, or big actor doing transaction = bad, doing something Sony never did = bad. Have not seen credible concern with an actual logical/undeniable path to a bad outcome for any group of gamers but yet the benefits to some are undeniable.  

Microsoft taking away Activision Blizzard games permanently from the PlayStation platform is absolutely a bad outcome. Promising to release Call of Duty on PlayStation platforms for the next ten years, if Microsoft doesn't try to renege those contracts like they did successfully with Indiana Jones, and failed to do so with Minecraft Dungeons, is not something I see as some benefit, since Microsoft won't be releasing CoD on PlayStation perpetually. As for the rest of Activision Blizzard's catalog, I expect that to be treated like Bethesda games, or how Microsoft planned to handle Sega if their M&A proposal was accepted; shortly after the acquisition closes, none of those games are going to be releasing on the PlayStation 5, outside of whatever is currently announced. When it comes to competing cloud services, and Nintendo, similar to the PlayStation platform, its only a temporary thing, and for all we know, they might only be doing it to appease regulators, especially with the information that has come out via unredacted court documents.

The many gamers who oppose this deal are concerned about the industry being completely consolidated in a decades time. The variety and choice in the catalog of games we have access to as consumers, on our platform of choice, will slowly disappear as publishers start getting bought up, and gaming becomes four or five walled garden ecosystems/subscription services, similar to the streaming wars. Even if Microsoft is the strongest in this front, they aren't going to acquire every single publisher out there, and they will lose a ton of content. As for Sony, they highlighted one of their paths forward in terms of M&A, where they plan to spin off their financial arm, in order to make bigger investments in their entertainment division. Sony has seen the music industry consolidate, and took part in it, they have seen the movie industry consolidate, and attempted to take part in it via Fox, and now they see the gaming industry beginning to consolidate, from their direct competitor nonetheless. Would Nintendo really sit idly by if Sony decides to acquire a publisher like Square Enix? That's also not considering what Amazon, Tencent, or Netflix will do once the floodgates open. 

Whether or not you think mass consolidation is an irrational outcome to Microsoft's biggest acquisition ever is where we may differ. Personally, I doubt industry consolidation will ease up if Acti/Blizz is cleared, only accelerate. 

They didn't "renege" on Indiana Jones, Microsoft didn't promise Disney anything, Zenimax formulated that contract agreement before Microsoft acquired them, Microsoft went to Disney and asked if they could make Indiana Jones exclusive and change the contract, Disney agreed. They also didn't "fail" to renege with Minecraft Dungeons (?) They own Mojang, they chose to release Minecraft Dungeons on PlayStation.

Changing contract agreements between two corporations is a whole lot different to what we're talking about here, the contract agreements that Microsoft have are enforced by the European Commission, if Microsoft tries to "renege" on them without a very serious explanation then the EC will come down on them hard, if Microsoft so flagrantly breaks the promises made to the EC to get the deal approved, then the EC is well within their power to force a divestiture.

Microsoft will continue releasing COD on PlayStation for as long as COD remains huge on PlayStation, exactly the same as they do with Minecraft. It simply makes zero financial sense to remove a title as massive as COD from PlayStation for such little benefit. They would LOSE money on it. There's ZERO evidence that this is their intention and they've even sworn under oath that they will continue releasing on PlayStation, Lol. What more does it take?

The rest of ABK's catalogue is slim, maybe Spyro and Crash become exclusive, Diablo releases every 10 years and I suspect that won't be exclusive either, Overwatch 2 was literally an update over Overwatch 1 so I don't anticipate an Overwatch 3 anytime soon and if it does, it could simply be an update over the Overwatch 2 client. WOW is PC only. Maybe Xbox fans will get some Blizzard New IP exclusive, Lol.

Hell there's even emails from Zenimax to Microsoft confused about why Activision-Blizzard is being treated differently to Zenimax in terms of exclusivity so no it isn't the same case at all, Activision-Blizzard is not being treated the same as Zenimax.

The Sega plans actually back up Microsoft...

They planned (if they acquired Sega) to keep all their IPs multiplatform, Lol.

Their priorities for future acquisition were/are PC, Mobile and Console/PC in Asia-Pacific.

Of course, they made these contracts to appease regulators, it doesn't change the fact that they're pro-competitive contracts which the companies have willingly signed and agreed that they're good contracts, Nvidia will have an army of lawyers for example, they aren't dumb, they know a good contract when they see one and wouldn't sign one if it wasn't.



^ ^ Eh, I doubt that is too much of a concern to MS if they really wish to take on the EC.

Remember, the legalized private lobbies the EC calls the "committee procedure" can effectively block the implementation of any EC measure and refer it to the Parliament. If there's enough money being made among the interests said committees represent (or the Parliament is headed by shady right-wing figures, which it usually is) the EC would probably do nothing to sanction them.

Google did worse in a larger market and was slapped with a fine equivalent to less than 1% of its yearly revenue, so that's probably the worst-case scenario for them.



 

 

 

 

 

EpicRandy said:

With current accepted EU remedies, MS can't add fees on streaming games for at least 10 years. 

Ten years should be enough for the cloud to precise itself, after that, I don't see how ABK Ips can give Xbox more of a dominant than the one judged insufficient in the console market space today even without consideration for Sony deals and the Nintendo ones like pretty much all the regulatory bodies have ruled on this.

I'm not saying they are adding additional fees, I'm saying they already come out with better margins than the other cloud based companies. Because they WILL get revenue from other streaming services for Call of Duty. Add that to the massive infrastructure they already have and their deep pockets, MS is perfectly capable of undercutting ANY competition.

Call of Duty has been the top IP for, what, 16 or 17 years? No company has been able to make an IP that proves significantly competitive to that franchise. The IP is more likely to remain the juggernaut it is today than it is not to. And, again, this is not JUST about the cloud, but about sub services overall. With this, MS has a massive advantage that it's competition will not be able to compete with. Using judicial ruling as evidence that others will be able to compete is ignoring the overwhelming amount of oligopolies we currently have in western society. We have done a bad job of regulating companies. A judge ruling in favor of MS isn't surprising, it's par for the course, and doesn't make it "right" just legal.  The fact is, other companies generally don't have the resources to compete unless they merge with another larger company. Which is what will probably happen eventually. Whether it be Sony, Nintendo, Ubisoft, Sega, Square, etc. We are already seeing this mass consolidation at work. 



Ryuu96 said:

They didn't "renege" on Indiana Jones, Microsoft didn't promise Disney anything, Zenimax formulated that contract agreement before Microsoft acquired them, Microsoft went to Disney and asked if they could make Indiana Jones exclusive and change the contract, Disney agreed. They also didn't "fail" to renege with Minecraft Dungeons (?) They own Mojang, they chose to release Minecraft Dungeons on PlayStation.

Changing contract agreements between two corporations is a whole lot different to what we're talking about here, the contract agreements that Microsoft have are enforced by the European Commission, if Microsoft tries to "renege" on them without a very serious explanation then the EC will come down on them hard, if Microsoft so flagrantly breaks the promises made to the EC to get the deal approved, then the EC is well within their power to force a divestiture.

Microsoft will continue releasing COD on PlayStation for as long as COD remains huge on PlayStation, exactly the same as they do with Minecraft. It simply makes zero financial sense to remove a title as massive as COD from PlayStation for such little benefit. They would LOSE money on it. There's ZERO evidence that this is their intention and they've even sworn under oath that they will continue releasing on PlayStation, Lol. What more does it take?

The rest of ABK's catalogue is slim, maybe Spyro and Crash become exclusive, Diablo releases every 10 years and I suspect that won't be exclusive either, Overwatch 2 was literally an update over Overwatch 1 so I don't anticipate an Overwatch 3 anytime soon and if it does, it could simply be an update over the Overwatch 2 client. WOW is PC only. Maybe Xbox fans will get some Blizzard New IP exclusive, Lol.

Hell there's even emails from Zenimax to Microsoft confused about why Activision-Blizzard is being treated differently to Zenimax in terms of exclusivity so no it isn't the same case at all, Activision-Blizzard is not being treated the same as Zenimax.

The Sega plans actually back up Microsoft...

They planned (if they acquired Sega) to keep all their IPs multiplatform, Lol.

Their priorities for future acquisition were/are PC, Mobile and Console/PC in Asia-Pacific.

Of course, they made these contracts to appease regulators, it doesn't change the fact that they're pro-competitive contracts which the companies have willingly signed and agreed that they're good contracts, Nvidia will have an army of lawyers for example, they aren't dumb, they know a good contract when they see one and wouldn't sign one if it wasn't.

The point about Microsoft changing the terms with Indiana Jones and Minecraft Dungeons is they could attempt to do the same thing with Call of Duty. If anything, the fact that Phil Spencer was trying to make Minecraft Dungeons exclusive, an IP which is on practically every platform, and makes sense being a multiplatform release, could indicate they are willing to eat some loss in unit sales, in order to drive subscription/platform growth. The same could be said for Call of Duty in this context, but on a much bigger scale, when it comes to driving growth. Sure, Minecraft Dungeons ended up releasing on every platform, but why was it even considered in the first place, especially with such a longstanding contract? 

Speaking of the European Commission, the contractual agreements they reached in court were about the cloud, and similar to the CMA, most of the console concerns were disregarded, and didn't require any remedies. Unless I'm missing something, Microsoft wouldn't be reneging anything if they ended up removing Call of Duty from PlayStation platforms, before the aforementioned 10 year agreement is up. With that said, I do think Microsoft would keep COD on PlayStation platforms for the rest of this generation, at the very least. 

As for what Microsoft would gain from removing Call of Duty from PlayStation: massive increase in GamePass subscriptions and Xbox hardware sales. It may be a massive gamble, in terms of maintaining the popularity of the IP, but I wouldn't classify it as such little benefit. Getting even a quarter of PlayStation COD players in their ecosystem would be huge for Microsoft. They would get 100% of the MTX cut on their platform, along with increased subscription rates, accessory sales, game sales, digital game sales, etc. Furthermore, I may be underselling how many players are willing to jump ship, if Call of Duty were to be made exclusive to the Xbox platform. 

Last edited by PotentHerbs - on 13 July 2023

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Has anybody considered successful companies need to build strategies with forecasting years in advance?

Eventually there won't be console hardware because everything will be a streaming/cloud. Yes I know Stadia died hard but it was too soon. Eventually hardware will be gone in the traditional sense, hence MS invested in software developers makes sense.



Reasons why it's good:

1) The anti-consumer management of Activision Blizzard will likely be gone.

2) More exclusive games for Xbox.

3) Billions injected into the gaming market, where new studios will start up and we get new games.

4) Forgotten franchises/I.P. might finally get some development? I.E. StarCraft 4, WarCraft 4, Kings Quest, Hexen, Spyro, Soldier of Fortune, Blur and so much more.

5) Competition for Sony and Nintendo who are also going to be forced to invest more into gaming, benefiting us, the consumer.




--::{PC Gaming Master Race}::--

haxxiy said:

^ ^ Eh, I doubt that is too much of a concern to MS if they really wish to take on the EC.

Remember, the legalized private lobbies the EC calls the "committee procedure" can effectively block the implementation of any EC measure and refer it to the Parliament. If there's enough money being made among the interests said committees represent (or the Parliament is headed by shady right-wing figures, which it usually is) the EC would probably do nothing to sanction them.

Google did worse in a larger market and was slapped with a fine equivalent to less than 1% of its yearly revenue, so that's probably the worst-case scenario for them.

Interesting years ahead. I think on balance, the merger will be a net negative for the industry. I'll be happy to be proven wrong if I am around in 10 years, maybe a prediction to revisit

Also, the thing I am most curious about right now is the CMA, what exactly happened? Was it the government pressure that made them fold in the end? or did MS really make them an offer they can't refuse? I hope we find out soon. 



They should've bought SEGA but whatever



I can't help wonder why so many people are scared of merit based systems.