Bobby Kotick, Brad Smith, Other Microsoft & Activision Execs Comment on CMA's Preliminary Decision

Following the preliminary approval from UK's CMA, Microsoft and Activision execs have published new statements.

[XiNatsuDragnel]

Once this is over we can go back to business but Microsoft will eat everything up to compete buy hey gaming right.

[crazyCoconuts]

If you believe the 10 year contract with PS is legit and bulletproof, not much should change in the short term.
MS claims to be playing the long game with cloud and PC, and not as concerned about consoles.
But who knows - they may have a surprise or two up their sleeves. Maybe there's a way they could twist the knife with COD and still honor that contract.

[Markdn]

Without playstation in the market cod sales would be poor at best and Microshaft know this. Starfield was underdeveloped to not make the series s look pathetic. And the series x might as well not exist because of Microshafts greed in trying to steal sales from playstation and failing miserably.

[DarXyde]

I've said this before, but it's entirely possible that Call of Duty remaining on PlayStation may well be contingent upon allowing XGP on PlayStation.

I think I have a pretty decent track record on anticipating what they do. They're hopelessly predictable in their strategies.

[crazyCoconuts]

@DarXyde - totally agree, that would be the perfect chess move for MS, and would make 100% sense.
Only thing that makes me doubt that is that Sony would certainly have had to see that and called it out if the contract allowed that wiggle room. Maybe I'm giving them too much credit, but that's an obvious thing to protect against, and I'd think they'd be crying foul from the high heavens if it were possible.
Non-disclosures might have been signed before they saw it, but still... that's something worth breaking NDA over

[Charlieboy333]

@DarXyde & Crazy There's no way Sony will allow gamepass on Playstation as it will directly interfere with PS+ first of all.

It would also mean that people already subscribed to PS+ would be required to take out ANOTHER subscription just to play COD. Or people that are not keen on subscriptions will be forced into signing up for months if it's only available via 'gamepass on PS', instead of being able to buy the game outright.

Sony ain't gonna do Microsoft favours at the expense of making things shit for THEIR customers. Also, wouldn't Sony be screwing themselves even further by losing money from sales, if people can only play it via a subscription....to Microsoft of all people?

I just don't see it happening. Playstation is not even going to make the next COD available on THEIR service day one. They prefer to have proper sales ( as they should ).

[DarXyde]

Charlieboy333,

I should clarify (my mistake):

I'm saying that this deal may allow for it in a traditional format now, but not beyond the deal. In addition to that, it is very possible the other ABK franchises would require that, since Sony only made a deal for Call of Duty. Perhaps that was why Sony only specified Call of Duty: Microsoft may have been okay with ALL franchises if Sony approved XGP. They said no, and therefore negotiated for one; MS's compliance is likely for court-pleasing reasons.

Just my thoughts.

This is actually MORE reason why Microsoft is moving into Cloud/digital stuff: if it's not available outside of the service on their own hardware, why would it be on other platforms?

People disagree, but I feel very on the nose with this one.

[343_Guilty_Spark]

What do you mean go back to business - you haven’t been playin games?

[XiNatsuDragnel]

Have you? Just asking a question with a question.

[343_Guilty_Spark]

Yes I play regularly with Mrs. XiNatsuDragnel

[Battlestar23]

Awesome so the deal can now pass. Hopefully MS quickly move on to buying Capcom, Ubisoft, Square Enix.

[neutralgamer1992]

UBI have Tencent money who are themselves a trillion dollar company so that ain’t happening. And good luck going through Japanese laws in buying one of their companies especially when you are a outsider

But the mindset you have is what’s wrong with Xbox fanboys. If it up to y’all you would want MS to buy up PlayStation and Nintendo next, because why have options let one company control everything

S/

[Aloymetal]

They all suffer from deranged syndrome, they don't even care about the games or anything like that, they just can't stand Sony which has been wiping the floor with their beloved green box aka the most irrelevant gaming platform on the planet and that is what truly hurts them.

[MrDead]

I wonder how long it'll take them to realise that the publishers MS are buying up are no longer competing with each other as well? The beigeification of consolidation.

[Gamerscore2077]

Let them be misinformed & ignorant. Now it’s going to be interesting to see how the worst selling platform holder is going to sustain all of those studios & their IPs.

[Sonic1881]

"Now it’s going to be interesting to see how the worst selling platform holder is going to sustain all of those studios & their IPs."

I've been saying this from the beginning. I'm so curious to see how it will all turn out. Microsoft can't even manage most of their first party studios 🤫

[ironmonkey]

hes a fanboy still paying rent. its ok to pay rent but hes a special boy.

[Outside_ofthe_Box]

Don't forget about Nintendo

[Markdn]

Microsoft would never get permission from any country to buy Nintendo.

[ChiefofLoliPolice]

You are what's wrong with gaming. Don't you realize that if MS keeps this up there will be less competition in the long run and gamers will suffer because of it. This may be a win for Xbox fans on the short term but in the long run if this keeps up we will all suffer from it.

Just because something sounds good on paper doesn't mean it will be good in practical ways.

[sagapo]

But if MS would drop out of the gaming industry and therefore less competition, you Sony fans would be ok with it?
I’m not a fan of these big acquisitions either tho, but that’s how business is done nowadays, sadly enough. It happens everywhere.

[ravens52]

I pretty sure I can say I speak for most people when I say. We just want MS to be better. To do better. We don't want MS gone, atleast I don't lol. I just want them to develop their own IP, creatively add to the gaming industry. That's NOT what they're doing, they're trying to buy it. They're trying to RUN it.

[Plague-Doctor27]

@sagapo very few people against the acquisition want MS to drop out of gaming. The problem with these acquisitions is MS is not adding anything to the industry. MS does not care about acquiring talent, they only care about acquiring content to put on GamePass to drive subs. They don't want to expand the industry, they are happy just owning more of the pie thats already there. Most of Sony's recent acquisitions are new studios with new IP that will hopefully bring something new to the table. What is the last IP Microsoft built from the ground up? Most people would be happy if MS spent $70 billion building up their current studios. Instead, MS is content slapping their logo on Candy Crush and COD for $70 billion while adding literally nothing that wasnt there before

[ravens52]

Exactly Plague.

[343_Guilty_Spark]

Federal lawyers couldn’t prove less competition but here you are claiming it lol

[sagapo]

@ Raven @ Plague:
To set it straight, I’m not defending the way MS is working. And yes, considering the amount of dev’s and publishers they bought, the amount of great exclusives they have is pretty low.
My response to Chief was only about the competition aspect of his message and the comments you read on this site from PS fans, especially since the leaks (perhaps based on how MS operates the last years, sure).

[sadraiden]

@sagapo

no one is advocating for xbox to just close up shop. if that's your strongest argument in favor of xbox acquiring ABK, yikes.

[sagapo]

@sadraiden: I already stated I DO NOT favor these big acquisitions! ( on another article) Again, I only responded on the competition aspect of Chief’s comment.

[Reaper22_]

Explain how we will suffer from this. How is this gonna cause less competition.
You guys talk about this like it was a hostile take over when it reality it was Activision who wanted this just as much as Microsoft.

[FinalFantasyFanatic]

@Sagapo,

Honestly? MS is barely any competition to Sony as it is, I don't think it would be a huge difference if they just evaporated out of existence in this market. Hopefully a decent competitor would rise up and take their place, otherwise it's up to Sony/Nintendo to keep each other on the straight and narrow.

Alternately, Microsoft could turn everything around and be a better competitor, but they won't with the direction they're heading in now, all in on Gamepass is the plan they're rolling with. Lately they've only serve to annoy me by buying up developers/publishers, putting out sub par games and forcing Sony to make this weird 3 tier PS Plus system (it really needs to be two, not three) because of Gamepass.

[stonecold3]

U wish Microsoft can’t buy Japanese developers the regulators won’t let that happen . Keep wishing thought never going to happen .

[Battlestar23]

MS is a trillion dollar company no one can stop them from anything anything and if Japanese regulators have a problem them I'm sure MS people in Congress will help deal with them.

[DarkHeroZX]

They cannot buy Ubisoft. Part of the provision for this deal to pass was they had to sell Activision's cloud business to Ubisoft

[sagapo]

Indeed

[raWfodog]

Don’t confuse them with facts DarkHeroZX. It makes a funny clicking sound in their heads.

[CombatEmu]

I always find this obsession over acquisitions and fervor for further centralization of the gaming industry to be rather... sad.

[Plague-Doctor27]

Problem is MS needs to more than triple GP subs in 5 years. They know they need to keep adding content to make it more enticing. With game development time, they know they cant do this by developing new IP. The only way to increase GP content is to buy publishers (not even studios) to throw ready made games on there ASAP. And most people don't care about the long term ramifications if it means they can play everything for $15 a month

[FinalFantasyFanatic]

It's really sad, we've seen this in other markets like movies, where Disney just swallowed up the majority of the industry and continuously made bad and anti-consumer choices. It's eerie how a similar situation could play out for the gaming industry, I hardly watch movies/TV as it is despite having a decent Home Theater system.

[vTuro24]

Tell me you're a brainwashed fanboy without telling me you're a brainwashed fanboy.

[crazyCoconuts]

troll alert lol

[jimbo676]

I agree also take 2 and cdpr

[bloop]

That would be fantastic Battlestar!! Imagine MS owning all those studios, then mismanaging them all like they've done with almost everything else they've bought so far! Then put the icing on the cake by giving these studios literally no incentive to make a quality product because everything ends up on GP and they've made bank already!! Imagine!! We could get games like Redfall releasing every month!!! How amazing would that be?!

[sadraiden]

It's fine if you have buyer's remorse because you bought an xbox for some reason. Don't take it out on everyone else with this brutal take.

[MrDead]

Well I'm guessing they are very happy, the rich just got even richer.

I wonder what this means not only for any competition currently in the industry but anyone else looking to join? The cost of entry has now gone up massively to enter the market as competition has less and less access to third party publishers, and we know MS has now been given the green light to buy up and remove anything they want from the industry.

...MS, a slow spreading disease of market consolidation.

[Outside_ofthe_Box]

They make more profit than Sony too apparently. The fact that the profit leader can just swallow up the market is insane. Why does it take until after the issue occurs for people to try and fix it when they could have obviously prevented it in the first place.

[TriniOutsider]

That's been debunked already. That they make more profit than Sony.

[rob-GP]

They honestly don't. Xbox doesn't actually report most of their expenses under Xbox, they lump them under MS so it doesn't affect their 'profit' for the shareholders.

They didn't factor in any acquisition costs, server upkeep for xCloud, Game Pass payments for games being added, etc... Sony, on the other hand, includes all of those in their PS financials.

Xbox has confirmed PS has over double the profit they make - and that's after Xbox has fiddled their accounts. The purchase of Bungie (2bn) is why the PS profits being posted on social media seems lower than usual

[Asplundh]

Gaming apocalypse theory aside, what MS games are you buying next?

[MrDead]

As long as people stay off GamePass and make that model unviable, I'll carry on buying whatever I want and support the game makers... oooh, did you think that was a gotcha? I'll never understand you fanboys.

[Asplundh]

You mean support MS and their vision that you keep crying about. Hell you're probably subbed to Gamepass too. What do you expect to achieve by regurgitating this stuff over and over? You talk about boycotts and still buy their products, guess you're the do as I say not as I do type, weak.

[MrDead]

"You mean support MS and their vision that you keep crying about."
So punish Bethesda by boycotting their games, you do know that people doing this will make 0% difference to MS's revenue? You can support the people that make the game and still screw MS buy not signing to GamePass, as they need sub numbers for their subscription service to be viable model.

"You talk about boycotts and still buy their products, guess you're the do as I say not as I do type, weak."

Show me where I said I'll boycott the game?.. because who loses in that MS or Bethesda, since day 1 I've been telling people to support the devs and buy the game on Steam... I guess you read whatever narrative fits your fantasies. I'll will support paying for games on Steam because at least the devs might see a cut no chance of that on GamePass as they are quite creative with attach rates and numbers.

"Hell you're probably subbed to Gamepass too"
Oh you got me, here's proof of me on Gamepass https://postimg.cc/PPPKHS2r

[MrBaskerville]

@MrDead
Won't profita rise immensly now that they bought most of the most profitable franchises in the gaming sphere?

[slate91]

W

[Whitey2k]

I wonder if Sony was to purchase EA Games for instance would it be stopped by the regulators or would it go through without much hurdles as Ms purchase was allowed to have zenimax and Activision

[Plague-Doctor27]

It would probably not be stopped. The only groups with any objection to ABK were the CMA and FTC. The CMA was concerned about cloud gaming which is now basically monopolized by Microsoft, so Sony wouldn't get any objections in that regard. The FTC has no teeth to actually do anything, just look at Ticketmaster

[DarkZane]

Everyone allowed it this time, but if MS tries to buy another big publisher, I don't think they will be allowed next time, everyone will block it, especially if they try soon.

However, MS buying Activision pretty much made it so Sony can buy whoever they want without any trouble because by allowing MS to buy both Activision and Zenimax, regulators have their hands tied if Sony tries the same thing.

[itsmebryan]

I doubt that would happen because MS has a very close relationship with EA and can always out spend Sony.

[-Foxtrot]

That’s the funny thing

Nobody can say shit about Sony if they managed to buy a publisher, Microsoft opened Pandora’s box and will be playing the same game

But knowing their luck and how twisted it is, I bet they would be stopped

[MrBaskerville]

We'll never know, because they'll never consider it.

[343_Guilty_Spark]

Welcome home Activision

[crazyCoconuts]

House of the Dead

[343_Guilty_Spark]

Starfield is lovely. Try it.

[DiRtY]

Great win for MS.

I remember how I was told that the deal was dead just 150 days ago.
If you want to laugh, read the comments here:
https://n4g.com/news/254801...

[Battlestar23]

I strongly suspect that MS will soon become the leader of the gaming industry and both Nintendo and Sony will no longer be able to compete with them.

[sagapo]

As long as Sony and Nintendo have their great exclusives, they have nothing to worry about imo. Their fanbase is pretty loyal.

[itsmebryan]

Nintendo is the only one with true exclusives that you can only play on their system. Playstation and Xbox games are both on PC. Xbox and my PC has me covered.

[purple101]

Which signs have led you to these suspicions

[Cockney]

I'll play, hypothetically that could happen but my question is in your eyes would that be a good thing? Hypothetically of course

[Aloymetal]

I'm still collecting comments like yours to review again by the end of this gen and even the next one. Thanks for your input;)

[thesoftware730]

So many conspiracy world-ending fearmongers on here..Sony makes great games and said that they would be perfectly fine, but you guys say this.

"Gaming as we know it is over"
"Xbox gamers don't care about games"
"Publishers won't compete anymore"
"Gamers will suffer"
"Blah, Blah, Blah"

I remasted a great quote by the Joker:

MS: I just did what I do best. I took Sony's little plan and I turned it on itself. Look what I did to gaming with a few acquisitions and GP. Hmmm? You know... You know what I've noticed? Nobody panics when things go "according to plan." Even if the plan is horrifying! If, tomorrow, I tell the press that, Silent Hill:R, FF7:R, FF16, and an attempt to make Starfield exclusive to Playstation, or Sony will pay to keep games off of GP, nobody panics, because it's all "part of the plan". But when I say A/B will be acquired, well then everyone loses their minds. Introduce a little anarchy. Upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos. I'm an agent of chaos. Oh, and you know the thing about chaos? It's fair!”

hahaha, I had too, too funny and true.

[crazyCoconuts]

You don't need to create fictional quotes from MS. We now have the actual leaked quotes. Where they want to buy Nintendo and Valve. And how buying Nintendo would be Phil's "career moment".
No need for wistful esoteric fiction about introducing chaos and upsetting the world order.
More like they lost consumers in all of their other products and the only way to hold on to the consumer market is to buy up gaming. Pretty boring big monopoly kinda stuff, sorry.

[thesoftware730]

Crazy,
You gotta admit the quote was funny though!

Haha, Sony said they have like 13 billion set aside just for acquisitions!!, and they bought Bungie!!

That's cool though..lol, can't make this shit up.

I know you are about to queue in the,
Bungie only has one game. (Even though it is a massive game)
70Bill is a lot more(cause Sony can't spend that much)
MS taking games(yeah, they paid for it lol)
blah, blah, blah

And you don't think Sony would like to acquire Nintendo? they cant afford Nintendo, but any game maker/console maker would be a complete idiot to not wanna own the most nostalgic, longest-running game company in history, with IP that rivals Disney!

[crazyCoconuts]

not a matter if intent - i'm with you, if Sony was the biggest company in the world like MS is, they'd probably be looking to do the same thing and we'd be worried about them as well.
As it stands, they're not...so...

[green]

Slow clap. Brilliantly said

[thesoftware730]

green,

I thought so as well.

Despite Sony's massive sales year, Sony-only fans have seemed so disgruntled lately.
I think it's because Sony has been so quiet this year in terms of first-party games, and seemingly putting a major focus on Gaas future.

It's like they lost most of the things they can brag about, First-party, and single-player games. PSVR 2 is a nice product, but the vast majority of gamers don't really care. Sony is releasing a nice streaming-only controller handheld, but again, the vast majority of gamers don't care. Lastly, they significantly raised the price of PS+,.

You even have dedicated Sony fans like Christopher calling Sony out and having to be on offense from the more rabid Sony-only fans on here. Shin even went out and bought an Xbox for SF.

[FrostedFire]

This is perhaps the cringiest thing I've ever read on here jfc lmao

[thesoftware730]

FrostedFire

Hahahaha,
It didn't even make you chuckle a bit? Come on, you know you chuckled.

[recoctimocassirnff]

You just need to look at MS past history to see where they are heading. It's not rocket science.

They want to outright buy nintendo...

But if you want to talk about conspiracy theories, there's no evidence to suggest Sony wanted to buy Starfield. The funny thing is, though, you out yourself when you say sony deserves ms buying BGS and Activision. You obviously know it's a bad thing, but it's fine when ms does it.

[Hofstaderman]

Ain't going to change jack for XBOX. Yall heading towards cloud exclusively. No more consoles soon. GP as a service offering. And you know what, you guys deserve it because you all cheered for this.

[S2Killinit]

What a slimy group of characters.

[sadraiden]

Fucking trash. Trash company buying trash company. The real loser is your average gamer. Consolidation hurts competition.

[Barlos]

Cancer

[iEatNapkinz]

Even with this happening and even if MS is telling the truth about not worrying about PS/Console gaming, they won't gain much more market cap then what they initially get from the actual purchase. This is just going to have Sony start R&D for FPS that can go up against COD.. That's the biggest reason they went for Bungie. Bungie can help get Sony on par with FPS mechanics while still making multiply games that will also make money for Sony, then those FPS games Sony make will slowly start gaining ground on the COD/OW base. It's generally the only area in gaming genres that sony doesn't have a masterful formula for. Almost every other "popular" genre in gaming, Sony has a studio for it.

[sci4me]

For me its more that i want them to create new ip:s that cover the loss of games like Fallout/Elder scrolls and possible Diablo?.

[MrBaskerville]

Sell off rights to ubisoft, then buy ubisoft.

[Barlos]

You just know they've considered it