Um Bungie. They were able to purchase them without taking their games off of other platforms or demanding that Xbox/PC gamers sign up for PlayStation Plus.
Your example is a bad one. Bungie made it part of their contractual terms in the acquisition that they remained multiplatform. It wasn't Sony being the good guys. All of their other acquisitions have been entirely exclusive. I don't buy what they are selling here.
You are making assumptions with no evidence. At no point has Sony ever indicated that they wanted their new Live service games to be anything other than multiplatform. It was obviously their plan going into the deal.
That’s dumb what he is saying they are really trying hard to stop the activision deal. You’re right it makes no sense they have bought so many studios and “took them off the market” by making them exclusive the list is huge. Such a hypocritical statement.
... you're comparing buying the biggest multiplatform publishers and banning competition from huge chunks of the gaming world to buying studios... that's like buying a brick and saying it's the same as buying a house.
@mrdead a developer is a developer no matter how you spin it. That is the topic at hand. A group of developers compared to one developer guess what they are still developers. No difference at all. I’m sure many people would love to play ratchet and clank but guess what sony bought them and made them exclusive the list goes on. Nothing wrong with that but let’s call bs on hypocritical statements like this. You could spin it and say all the studios Sony has bought and made exclusive over its lifetime surpasses what Microsoft has bought thus far when added up.
No it's not, it makes perfect sense when you objectively look at it: Sony either built their studios, or bought studios with which they already had a preferential relationship. Guerilla Games, Housemarque, Bluepoint or Insomniac used to work mainly, and actually usually exclusively, for Playstation platforms prior to being acquired by Sony.
You're understanding of studios compared to publishers is where your argument falls. Publishers, owners of many studios, decades of multiplatform ips, game engines, motion cap studios... etc are not comparable to a game studio
@mrdead from my awareness publishers don’t make games developers do. So when buying a publisher yes you ultimately get other things besides the developers. But that is the big price the ip that the developers make.
The main point here is that developers are not taken off the market. Are you really that blind by your loyalty that you don’t see when buying a publisher or developer regardless of how “close” the relationship is at the end of the day a developer is taken off the market regardless of size or what additions come with it. if they remain independent they at least always have the option to do multiplatform games. Your logic is flawed.
Take insomniac they made a game with Microsoft “sunset overdrive”but then Sony bought them and took a developer off the market.
Bottom line is this is a hypocritical statement big time.
Loyalty, grow up kid, I'm not even a console gamer
Learn the difference between publishers and studios and you might understand the gulf of difference with comparisons you've made. Studios are not the same as publishers, hence the price tags of tens of billions.
They aren't though ....they are only buying who work very closely with them like 2nd party studios .... Even when they bought Bungie they didn't take their games off the market
Maybe he means 'future' acquisitions? i get that MS is keeping certain contracts in place with theirs but if a dev wants to make a game exclusive or multiplat, it should be their decision. Neither MS or Sony's. At the end of the day its about making $$ and a game that can reach a wider audience has a greater chance of doing that than being restricted to a single platform.
I know people like to bring up Bethesda and Starfield but seriously... that game wasnt very far along when MS bought them and it may very well get a PS release after it releases on XB/PC. But it needs to get finished before that happens. Same with any other game that 'may have been' touted for PS but now is uncertain. People just have to give it time and let the suits work things out.
For me, its why I play multiple,platforms. Because i know this industry is fluid and something you like may end up somewhere else. I won't deny myself the enjoyment of a game simply because of the system its on. That's just petty af. I'm sure I insulted a lot of single platform users with that last bit but to each their own.
The 2 main reasons for excuslives is:
1) to draw you into buying and locking you onto their platform and marketplace where they take a cut for every game bought, vastly moreso in digital sales.
And
2) By focusing on a single set of static hardware they can get a lot more out of the hardware than anyone else, hints why 1st party titles are generally ahead of 3rd party games in many technological aspects. It also saves them quite a lot of development costs by simplifying everything, no bouncing between versions to ensure stability and parity between them all.
That's why exclusives exist, and what gives them that edge. Once you start developing as multiplatform from the start, resources are split, and you are most likely losing that edge in one way or another.
All of that is viable... for the time. We are not talking PS2 vs Gamecube vs Xbox here. where each machine had its own specs and programming language differences. The current trend of basing these machines on x86 was meant to simplify the process of both development for a single platform as well as for making things much easier to transition to another variance in platform if need be.
In the PC space, its like the wild west with an insurmountable number of cpu/gpu combinations. And yet they are able to pull it off by making the games scalable. That is what is happening here in the console space as well. Sure its not as lucrative as limiting the scope to just a single set of specs... but when companies want to recoup the cost of investment, they sometimes make the decisions to expand outward and reel in others where they can.
Exclusives will still exist but the reliance on them is waning.
I would argue the first reason is the only one. The second one is a byproduct of the first. I don't think any devs go into a project just to get the most out of the hardware. I think it just comes down to money but the second statement is a natural result of that process.
"that game wasnt very far along when MS bought them and it may very well get a PS release after it releases on XB/PC."
I don't think so Darth. MS may not be as headstrong with exclusives like Sony is but if they can keep a game in their ecosystem exclusively they will. Besides Sony has no plans in sharing any of its games. Never have and never will. MS knows this so. They're keeping new Bethesda games to themselves.
somehow the presence of MLB on xbox and Death stranding on PC gamepass say otherwise. MLB was under contract with the MLB to be more widely available and the PC version of DS was under contract with a 3rd party but both are still commonly referred to as Sony games because of the initial development, publishing and reception.
"Never" just doesnt carry the same weight as it once did when $$$ is involved.
Those are really dumb examples, MLB was pushed cross platform at the demand of MLB, not Sony/Playstation's decision. Death stranding was always a timed exclusive, Kojima productions is not a Sony studio, that's like saying The Medium is MS game.
Sony was reportedly in talks to sign Starfield exclusive before Xbox’s Bethesda buyout. You can google it and there is articles about it. I just don’t understand what sony are trying to achieve here. The Microsoft/Activision deal will go through. I find it hard to believe that it won’t.
In the early 90s Sony instantly drove Atari, Commodore, Panasonic, Philips and Sega out of the industry with their money (which in comparison to games companies back then was huge), aggressive marketing and acquisitions. Some of those companies barely survived. Nintendo took a decade to recover.
Sony should stop crying about Call of Duty and concentrate on doing what they do best. Making bloody brilliant single player narrative driven experiences.
@Shinoff or maybe I’m the background they were up for sale and Microsoft could afford the price then got to them first .. why does it always have to be them creating a monopoly ?? Ppl said the same thing about them buying Bethesda. If you did research you would of saw they were tanking and could of came close to not existing anymore.
That game wasn't very far along when MS bought them. The sale only went through about a year and abut ago. At the aoiint the game had been in development for over 5 years and was about 1 year from it's targeted release window.... so yeah it was far along.
@darth if you look at their hiring and stuff at the time they had recruited people with experience on PlayStation over 3 years prior to that point. So actually that simply isn't true. As soon as the basics of the gsme are done an AAA developer will be ensuring they continuously benchmark it against each console and checking it can run. In particular PlayStation running using a Linux based OS required a fair bit of work to ensure it'd running well. You dint wait until the final year or two to try and do all of that you have a second or 3rd development pipeline simultaneous to the others ensuring things work and run and working on the game for each console.
Not doing so is a recipe for disaster and a cyberpunk 2077 situation.
Console exclusives acts as incentives for buying a specific platform. The reasons I bought a PS5, Series X, and Switch were because of the console exclusives.
The only time I was a fanboy was during the 16-bit era owning a Genesis only. And the main reason I bad mouthed the SNES? Cuz I simply couldn’t afford both. The moment I got a SNES for my birthday the fanboy died and a gamer was born. Playing Starfox and Sonic, I realized the machine never mattered, it was always the games.
Not sure why anyone would downvote your comment. Not being a fanboy should be the goal. Puffing your chest out because of the plastic box you own is kid stuff.
It's not really petty to have someone loyal to one platform. The reason may be one doesn't find interest in the other platform's exclusives. My first console was a SNES but then I went to PS because of the exclusive games it had & I never looked back by buying the PS2,PS3,PS4 & now the PS5. I haven't had any interest to play any games on Nintendo's past consoles nor have I bought a Switch due to my lack of interest in most of their exclusives. The only reason I own an XBSX is that I won an XBSS & I decided to trade it in which cost me next to nothing in cash for the trade-in. I must say for me personally it's been very disappointing this entire year that MS/XB has not released any AAA exclusives & for me majority of this year GP has been mostly lackluster when it comes to brand new titles because most of them are meh Indies. My PS5 is mostly played on the weekends though I play an hour or 2 of some of the classic titles on XB through GP. Though I am looking forward to XB finally releasing some new AAA exclusives to finally play in 2023.
"if a dev wants to make a game exclusive or multiplat, it should be their decision" No. For 1st party studios, MS, Sony & Nintendo have the absolute right to order those studio to do whatever project they want. If those studio don't like what they're ordered to do, the only way for rebellion is a self buy-out, like Bungie did multiple times.
Huh? Whether you're buying a new dev or an old one you are in fact taking that dev off the market. If you want to buy studios then buy studios, cool. But don't come with this holier than thou bs. The author points out that only two of Sony's seven acquisitions would even apply to what he's talking about.
Except that with Microsoft purchases all these up that were available in every platform will now be available in less platforms. So they're being completely dishonest. It's less accessible. Sony buying studios that were already acting as strong first party support isn't anywhere in the same boat or planet.
I understand what you're saying and I don't disagree, but you're arguing an entirely different point. I am in no way saying that Sony and Microsoft's purchases are the exact same. My point is that Herman is clearly being dishonest. He's pretending that Sony are only buying brand new, fledgling studios but that isn't remotely true. Only two of the teams they bought were literally just starting. The rest of them were already staffed up and working on a project. Herman is usually a pretty honest interviewee so it's bizarre to see him make such a clearly untrue statement.
In a way you are correct but in another you are wrong. If Sony makes an acquisition it always goes exclusive unless staying multiplatform is part of the contractual obligation as in the case of Bungie. They don't have a history of sharing anything unless they are forced to like with MLB The Show. Microsoft on the other hand has launched new games on other platforms that they were under no obligation to do (Either with exclusives like Minecraft Legends or with publishing rights as in Ori or Cuphead). Also if Microsoft makes the acquisition, they put all of it on gamepass which can be streamed on any device. Sure it isn't local play but you could argue that opens it up to more platforms and makes it accessible to all. You could be a PlayStation gamer and play all of the MS games through streaming on your tv or whatever device. If PlayStation acquires a studio you are basically f'd if you don't own their device or you have to wait 3 years for a possible PC version.
Agreed. He may be dishonest but I stopped listening to PR a long time ago. At the end of the day actions and outcomes matter. Genuineness would be welcomed for sure but I care about the results more than the talk.
No the point he is making is that (excluding bungie but that arrangement is different to the others) Sony buy devs they are already working closely with that generally have been acting a a 2nd or 3rd party exclusive developer. They are also typically their largest customer by a large margin. Microsoft is buying whole publishers that make primarily or only 3rd
Party multiplatforn titles and regardless of what they say so far their actions speak louder than words - making their titles exclusive to their plaftorm/service. That is what he is saying. Sony buying the devs doesn't take them off the market because they were never on the market to behind with. Look at insomniac, sucker punch, blueprint etc they were basically ps exclusive developers for years beforehand
I think what he was trying to communicate is their intent is to acquire studios that fit their identity, as opposed to just buying them up in an attempt shift the market.
XBox was Activision Blizzards 4th largest customer. This isn’t an organic acquisition, this is a clear attempt to seize the market.
Business is business so it is what it is, but let’s not pretend that it is something else.
Nah, Phil is god and the saviour of gaming, he rescued activision heroically from the evil clutches of Kotick and co, without him, Activision would have gone under with all of their IPs for sure without him with their enormous financial struggles.
There's a clear difference but you'll hear the whataboutism anyway. Like Sony timed exclusives when Microsoft was notorious for doing it with games like Tomb Raider that was used to try and go up against Uncharted. When Tomb Raider sells more on PlayStation and is more known as a PlayStation game than an Xbox game.
They'll talk about Insomniac when they were known in making PlayStation games. It's Microsoft's fault for not pushing for another Sunset game. Just like they didn't push for a sequel to Alan Wake.Talk about Spider-Man when Microsoft was asked first by Disney to make a Marvel game. Microsoft declined. And Spider-Man has shown up in other games.
Just like using Tomb Raider, Microsoft purchased companies that made more money on PlayStation. They didn't make more on Xbox. They were not bought because they were a perfect fit in Microsoft's company. Xbox fans can't even name a company that made more money on Xbox that Sony took away. Can't name Bungie as Sony has left them to do multiplatform games.
When you spend at least 80 billion dollars, more money than the 60 billion dollars it would take to repair Florida after the recent natural disaster, and not use that to make games studios, not to make games, not to make new IPs, not to improve games like the trash that has become Halo, to not improve the internal output of games against their competitor that is worth 20 times less, you know it's to hurt and kill competition. They spend more time trying to cut Sony at the knees than make games.
There's isn't a gamer here that doesn't think that at least 80 billion could have produced at least 800 AAA games that have 100 million production dollars each. Don't try and play us with whataboutism and excuses. Sony is doing it in a much better way than trying to buy up the industry.
Exactly. Sony PlayStation has flaws. They aren't some idol of perfection like what Xbox fans try to make Phil but in the gaming industry they're definitely doing a bang up job giving us new and exciting games every single generation.
Xbox has just been trying to catch waves and it doesn't seem that will stop anytime soon. I do wonder what Sony will do to try to get the type of games from all those Bethesda studios.
All the money Xbox has spent and we're still waiting. It's a meme at this point.
It takes time to make games. You can't expect them to have games ready from all of those studios right after the purchase. Some people are just impatient. The Bethesda purchase was an investment in the future and not the present.
All companies have flaws. Microsoft used to do this stuff too but what people don't realize or think through is that it comes down to leadership. The executives for both companies have been replaced multiple times over the years which is why it isn't relevant to say x company did this before when that was entirely different leadership. During the PS4 era Sony had better leadership than they do today. They were more gamer focused but I feel they have fallen back into the PS3 era market leader arrogance that has cut into the consumer friendly perception they had just a few years ago. I would argue that Phil has been more consumer friendly than previous Microsoft leadership and more so than the current PS leadership under Jim Ryan.
But as far as the acquisitions go I would prefer they not happen at all but if I had to pick the lesser of two devils it would be Microsoft. Their method at least lets people play their games if they don't own their system. Sony completely locks it down. Not to mention all the crazy stuff they do like charging money for crossplay and whatnot.
Yes leadership is what can deliver great games and has great dev and talent retention. This is common sense. Outside of that we have companies that can deliver the games. Microsoft can't seem to do that. No matter the time or money.
@TheDibbler
''It takes time to make games.''
When it comes to anything xbox, there's always an excuse, they've in the gaming industry for 20 years and suddenly MS realized they didn't have enough games?, ffs. How much time do they need? another 20 yrs?
Meanwhile PlayStation is constantly releasing goty contender games, every year, every gen and all that without having a trillion dollar cow like Windows is for xbox. It's embarrassing.
Activision was for sale. Microsoft has the money to buy them. Trust me, if Sony could afford them, they would buy them.
Blame Microsoft when they don't push for games like sunset overdrive 2 or alan wake 2, but when they finally start pushing for IP's and studios, people complain. What would you have them do? Let someone else buy Activision and when they remove the games off Xbox, say Microsoft had a chance to buy them and they did not push?
PlayStation was built with Sony's money. Now Microsoft is using money to build Xbox.
Bungie historically had a significant Microsoft partnership and they made their games multiplatform while under Activision.
Bluepoint historically has downported games like Titanfall to the 360 and been involved in mulitplat development.
Insomniac has been active in the PC vr space amking games for occulas and did make sunset overdrive for ms.
I don't agree with consolidation period same with Activision and ms nerger or the Bethesda merger consolidation of the industry will lead to a lack of innovation and simply buying studios for their greatwst hits and locking them away from the fanbase.
Sony can't play this card I know it's not on the same level as taking cod and locking it behind the Xbox but I don't care about cod as much as incare about thebother 30 years of Activision ip even if it's dormant like Toby hawk, Spyro, crash prototype etc. Or Bethesda IP like fallout and doom.
We need regulators to step in on both sides and end the consolidation efforts we are seeing while we still have a chance
The only way regulators can step in is if a purchase would violate monopoly laws. I don't know the percentages off the top of my head but I do know that even with the Activision purchase Microsoft wouldn't have crossed it due to the sheer number of studios/publishers out there. I saw somewhere that even with this purchase they would still at best be the third largest in the space behind Sony and someone else.
He's only partially telling the truth with studios like Haven, but when they bought BluePoint or Insomniac, they took them off the board for others, simple fact. The key difference being they nearly always have a close relationship with these studios anyway, how many of Housemarque's games were Sony exclusive? Insomniac rarely had their big AAA games on other platforms. Sony and Nintendo are MUCH less disruptive with their acquisitions compared to MS since they started going after publishers instead of just studios.
Insomniac made one game for MS they where still independed. They where at that time not an MS studio. Then MS let them not made another game. It was the great contact they had with Sony and they're own decision to be part of the Sony studios again. Bluepoint was making 3D games for PC., so taken them of the board from other platforms is not true. By the way when Sony bought studios most of them where small in the beginning like Naughty Dog and Guerrilla. Guerrilla was a small studio is Amsterdam and the made Killzone for them. Sony has a history of buying smaller studios and helped them grow to what they are now. Buying up complete publishers with big studios who where making wel knowed and great selling games on all platforms and keeping them exclusive for MS is a world of difference , and xboxfans boys know that. All does games from those publishers where coming to Xbox anyway, so you guys where loosing nothing. But cheering that the games will MS, Xbox only, is dumb. You lost nothing and winning nothing....
Let's see: Polyphony, Insomniac, Guerrilla, BluePoint, Naughty Dog,... It looks pretty " Taking Devs off Market (of other platforms) with Acquisitions" to me. Bungie maybe the only exception.
"PlayStation Studios chief Hermen Hulst said it's not necessarily true that Sony is taking game studios off market with its acquisitions." Because Insomniac games are being made for Xbox still? What? The ignorance of the statement is blowing up in their face on social media right now. Typical.
What lol shit make no sense
Maybe he means 'future' acquisitions? i get that MS is keeping certain contracts in place with theirs but if a dev wants to make a game exclusive or multiplat, it should be their decision. Neither MS or Sony's. At the end of the day its about making $$ and a game that can reach a wider audience has a greater chance of doing that than being restricted to a single platform.
I know people like to bring up Bethesda and Starfield but seriously... that game wasnt very far along when MS bought them and it may very well get a PS release after it releases on XB/PC. But it needs to get finished before that happens. Same with any other game that 'may have been' touted for PS but now is uncertain. People just have to give it time and let the suits work things out.
For me, its why I play multiple,platforms. Because i know this industry is fluid and something you like may end up somewhere else. I won't deny myself the enjoyment of a game simply because of the system its on. That's just petty af. I'm sure I insulted a lot of single platform users with that last bit but to each their own.
Huh? Whether you're buying a new dev or an old one you are in fact taking that dev off the market. If you want to buy studios then buy studios, cool. But don't come with this holier than thou bs. The author points out that only two of Sony's seven acquisitions would even apply to what he's talking about.
I think what he was trying to communicate is their intent is to acquire studios that fit their identity, as opposed to just buying them up in an attempt shift the market.
XBox was Activision Blizzards 4th largest customer. This isn’t an organic acquisition, this is a clear attempt to seize the market.
Business is business so it is what it is, but let’s not pretend that it is something else.