It's not because either MS of Sony are free to go and buy other companies (until eventually prevented by monopoly attempt) that it is good, and that is the point of the thread question.

In my view it is not a good thing, at all, and I don't want to see Sony going and make the situation even worse as a comeback.

IMO both should be striking to do better rather than trying to take out stuff from the other to look better.

Taking massively successful/famous third party studios under the onwership of a first party company is not good at all, IMO.

Even if Microsoft's acquisition goes through, gaming will still be far away from the state of the other industries you mentioned. You also have to consider how things are progressing in gaming: Microsoft's acquisition of Bethesda went through quickly, but already on their second big acquisition, they have to make huge concessions to even have a chance of it going through. Should it go through, it will be a given that a potential third acquisition on this scale will necessitate even bigger concessions on Microsoft's behalf; that is, if there's even a realistic chance left for a third acquisition.

Essentially, you could say that the institutions who are supposed to watch over these things have learned something from how other industries have developed into a few companies owning virtually everything.

There's a tremendous amount of fearmongering that Microsoft could/will eventually control almost everything, but it's just not reasonable. One angle here is the one I have addressed above. Another angle is that it is a pretty big assumption that the IPs Microsoft gets under control will still be as valuable in ten years as they are today; it is a big assumption because Microsoft has shown that they are more miss than hit when managing IPs, be it their own or the ones they've taken over. Ten years is a very long time in gaming terms, because you only need to look at gaming history to see that the most valuable IPs do change drastically over the course of a decade. There are some mainstays, but it's more common that IPs fade and/or get replaced by something new when you look at the overall output from all major game publishers.

Or you could look at all this from yet another angle. The A-B acquisition is one where either Microsoft or Sony loses, depending on how it ends. Arguing that one corporation's wish shall be blocked will always mean sticking up for the other corporation, no matter how much someone may mince their words and act as if it is all for the greater good of consumers in the short, mid and long term. Facts are that Sony is most of the time the first company to raise prices: Be it consoles, games or subscriptions. That's why it's perplexing that so many people want to side with Sony for the sake of consumers. But I suppose this is the effect of the long curated bad guy image of Microsoft and good guy image of Sony.

Lastly, if we objectively judge which gamers profit from this acquisition, it's undeniable that it will be good for Xbox, PC and Nintendo. Of the four camps, only the PS ecosystem is debatable. This means the acquisition will be good for the majority; Xbox + PC + Nintendo is greater than PS.

...

As a relevant sidenote, the last time gaming was at crossroads comparably to this one, it was exactly one decade ago when Microsoft wanted to impose anti-consumer policies with the Xbox One. Back then gamers decided to go with Sony at the cost of getting the online multiplayer paywall forced on them; they could have chosen the PC or Nintendo, but they did not. Blocking Microsoft for the benefit of Sony was a dumb idea back then, it's still a dumb idea now. The discussions today are just as fake as they were back then. It's not about acting for the benefit of the greater good, it's about preserving Sony's way of business.

Good business decision because the Xbox can get more than forza and halo as console exclusives. Business decisions don't always benefit consumers. But depending what exclusives the Xbox gets I might actually buy one.

I prefer a complete separation of business and state. Anytime government butts into anything, it makes it worse. And we actually have a really good example here, if the reported ending of X cloud in the UK is truly what has come of the CMA's actions in this case. The only thing the CMA has done here is hurt UK consumers by reducing choice in the way that they access video games.

For me, it's not so much that I think this deal is a net benefit to me or anyone else. But, I think that government telling these businesses what to do would be a net negative. So, I'm glad that, at least in most of the world, government has not been able to tamper with these businesses significantly (in this case).

Poll needed OP

op is asking why, so it will be hard to make a poll.

But then your position isn't on the ABK transaction and its impact on relevant markets but on a political position against the merger in general. It's a perfectly fine position, but you'd have to explain why should MS be the one entity to be reviewed under this different standard.

On the matter of whether MS will take away relevant ABK Ips, MS has more than enough done to ensure it was not the case, they never planned to make CoD exclusive even Jim Ryan never believe it was to be the case. So I think we can fairly put that concern to rest.

Nah, the government should definitely be butting in when it comes to labour laws. Businesses are terrible for exploiting employees!

The scale of this buyout is completely unprecendent and involves the biggest multiplatform game franchise there is.

The only thing on par with that would be Nintendo or Sony buying Take Two and securing GTA franchise as their own, which would definitely also cause a major response as a result.

Even the smaller but still big buyouts like Bethesda or Bungie are nothing compared to what is happening now. Either way, that doesn't mean those are good either, just not as relevant as what is going on now.

Sony has been on a bit of an arrogance streak following the success of the PS4. I think it's okay for them to be knocked down a peg or two.

Beyond that, it doesn't affect me in any meaningful way, so I don't really care all that much.