Topic: United States Federal Trade Commission Suing To Block Microsoft Acquisition Of Activision Blizzard King

[Shaymin]

So about that Call of Duty post...

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/news/62319/united-states-federal-trade-commission-suing-to-block-microsoft-acquisition-of-activision-blizzard-king

The largest objection to the Microsoft / Activision merger has been levied in the home country of the two monoliths.

The United Stated Federal Trade Commission (FTC) voted 3-2 today to proceed with a lawsuit blocking the $68.7b buyout of the Call of Duty / Warcraft / Candy Crush publisher by Microsoft. Although the deal was cleared in some smaller jurisdictions, competition bodies in the US, UK, and European Union have all raised objections.

The suit alleges that allowing the acquisition would harm competition in the industry, and was rumored prior to the US Thanksgiving weekend.

[Luigi Dude]

Good, companies like Microsoft shouldn't be allowed to buy up large sections of the industry.  Yeah everyone talks about how great Phil Spencer is but he's not going to be head of Microsoft's gaming division forever.  As we've seen time and time again, large Western companies love to do complete 180's when someone new is in charge. 

Does anyone want Microsoft owning half the industry when some like Don Mattrick is in charge again who will have no problem gutting many of the studio's they've bought these last few years and pushing crap like always online, mandatory Kinect and no used games.

Hell, what's to stop Phil Spencer himself from doing this a decade from now if Microsoft gets to a point where they own so much of the industry he doesn't have to pretend to be a nice guy anymore.  Seriously, Microsoft history is filled with so much shady **** I don't trust anyone from that company. 

[UncleBob]

Maybe it's because I just don't care about Activision, but I don't see the big deal.  Microsoft will leverage Activision as an exclusive studio?  Okay?  Every company has their exclusive studios.  If I were Activision and I wanted this deal to go through, I'd just say "Well, we're not going to make any more Playstation games anyway".  I don't think they can be compelled by the legal system to do so?

[broodwars]

Maybe it's because I just don't care about Activision, but I don't see the big deal.  Microsoft will leverage Activision as an exclusive studio?  Okay?  Every company has their exclusive studios.  If I were Activision and I wanted this deal to go through, I'd just say "Well, we're not going to make any more Playstation games anyway".  I don't think they can be compelled by the legal system to do so?

The problem is that Activision is a major publisher with 15 studios under its belt, not to mention all the IP. Just as a point of comparison, according to Google Sony has 19 studios currently under its PlayStation umbrella. Microsoft currently has 23 under Xbox. If Microsoft were to be allowed to purchase Activision, they would have literally almost double the number of studios Sony has. While that is nowhere near the record right now (that belongs to the Embracer Group at 131 studios), it's a considerable advantage.

According to the documentation Sony provided the UK Government, Call of Duty alone makes more money than all of Sony's 1st party studios' games in a given year combined, and by a significant margin. It's bad enough that Microsoft has been artificially propping up its failing Xbox division with profits from the PC division all these years without giving them an even more substantial financial advantage.

While I don't have hope that this will pan out, this acquisition absolutely should be stopped. Purchasing a studio or 2 is one thing, but allowing Microsoft to continue to simply buy its way into market dominance is absurd. Even more absurd is allowing it just because Microsoft has been utterly incompetent at managing their studios so far.

[UncleBob]

>Call of Duty alone makes more money than all of Sony's 1st party studios' games in a given year combined, and by a significant margin.

I mean, okay... but that's a Sony problem?

[broodwars]

>Call of Duty alone makes more money than all of Sony's 1st party studios' games in a given year combined, and by a significant margin.

I mean, okay... but that's a Sony problem?

I think it's kinda all our problem if a console manufacturer purchases the marketshare of an entire OTHER console manufacturer, especially when that company is known to make their games exclusive as soon as the government agencies stop watching. I also think it's in our best interest to not incentivize companies to simply buy their competition

Activision is just too big to allow any console manufacturer to own. And I'd be saying the same thing if the long-rumored Sony acquisition of Square Enix were to happen.

[UncleBob]

Like... why?

A quick Google search shows Microsoft and Activision's combined 2022 profits to be about what Sony, alone, has done.  No one complains about Nintendo owning hardware and software and they sell insane amounts of things.

And I don't buy the competition argument.  We live in an age were a dude in a garage can make a game from scratch and get it published on multiple platforms, including PC and mobile.  Anyone can compete.

I guess the last Activision game I bought was Skylanders, so it's no big loss to me if they went Microsoft exclusive... so maybe that's why I don't care.

[ThePerm]

I think Activision Blizzard is smaller in the grand scheme of things than people think. I'd be more concerned if they bought Valve, or Epic studios. The only thing that's going to happen from Microsoft buying Activision Blizzard is there will probably be a resurgence of 1990s PC franchises.  Which, won't happen otherwise.

I think Microsoft is going to move on from the X-box brand in the next generation. There is no need for PCs and consoles to be separate things.

[UncleBob]

>resurgence of 1990s PC franchises.

Yes, please.  Activision is happy churning out not much beyond COD sequels.  Gimme a Heretic/Hexen sequel, please.

[Luigi Dude]

Microsoft has a ton of their own IP's they don't do anything with.  Anyone who thinks Microsoft will care about the more obscure Activision properties is going to be very disappointment.

[UncleBob]

I feel like Microsoft will do whatever they think they can make money with.

I feel like Activision has already given up on most of these properties and there's a slightly higher chance Microsoft would re-evaluate  and potentially repurpose.

How about this - instead of Microsoft buying all of Activision outright, Activision puts everything up eBay style, piece mealing it out to the highest bidder.  Obviously, COD would go for big bucks, but maybe a smaller group could pay for one of the smaller IPs and do something with it.  Could be interesting.