Topic: Formal Agreement For Call Of Duty On Nintendo Platforms Signed, Only Takes Effect With Microsoft Purchase

[Shaymin]

This time it's on paper, but it still requires Microsoft to spend a nearly-nice amount of money.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/news/62958/formal-agreement-for-call-of-duty-on-nintendo-platforms-signed-only-takes-effect-with-microsoft-purchase

It's official - if Microsoft acquires Activision Blizzard King, Nintendo platforms will get Call of Duty day and date.

Microsoft president Brad Smith announced the agreement's formal signature late last night, calling it a "binding 10 year legal agreement" for the popular nationalist shooter series to be on Nintendo systems day and date with Xbox platforms. The deal reportedly contains "full feature and content parity".

The deal comes as Microsoft meets with European regulators today in an attempt to have the $68.7bn purchase of ABK approved without conditions; proposed methods of approval included Call of Duty as a franchise or the "Activision" portion of the company being divested.

We’ve now signed a binding 10-year contract to bring Xbox games to Nintendo’s gamers. This is just part of our commitment to bring Xbox games and Activision titles like Call of Duty to more players on more platforms. pic.twitter.com/JmO0hzw1BO

— Brad Smith (@BradSmi) February 21, 2023

[M.K.Ultra]

It seems weird that they have signed on to making games for an IP that have not yet acquired. I am guessing that if the deal does not go down, Activision has no obligation to make any games for Nintendo?

[Adrock]

I tend to think these mega large companies should be broken up rather than become larger though so many mergers and acquisitions have happened with little more than a 🤷‍♀️ by most governing bodies that I have a hard time caring about this one. If y’all are going to do it anyway, this whole song and dance routine seems like a colossal waste of time.

From a gaming perspective, I’ve dabbled very little in Call of Duty so this doesn’t affect me much personally. Per some cursory googling, the last Call of Duty on a Nintendo platform was Call of Duty: Ghosts in 2013.

It seems weird that they have signed on to making games for an IP that have not yet acquired. I am guessing that if the deal does not go down, Activision has no obligation to make any games for Nintendo?

That’s the way I read it. That 10-year agreement is contingent on the acquisition going through though there’s nothing currently or previously stopping Activision Blizzard from releasing anything on Nintendo hardware other than it didn’t want to. This formal agreement is clearly meant to push the acquisition through regulators, intended as an act of good faith even if it isn’t. Trying to take a wider view of this, 10 years is a really short amount of time compared to potentially owning one of the oldest, largest publishers forever.

[broodwars]

It takes quite a bit of arrogance to issue a formal 10 year agreement with another company to provide content you don't own that several world governments have announced their intentions to prevent you from owning.

I suppose this is Microsoft's way of trying to pretend they're still going to offer their Monopoly-driven content to other platforms in order to appease said governments, but after how they handled Bethesda I don't think anyone's going to buy it.