Well this is relatively big news.
Personally, I'm very uneasy with single companies owning more and more of the popular gaming space.
This is crazy, seems like Microsoft will just go around buying up everything they desire given they money they have to play with.
Personally I wouldn't play much of those games outside of the very odd game of Warzone these days, but it makes you wonder what is the next acquisition they're going to target? Can't be good overall tbh, healthy competition is good but there's a limit to this sort of thing tbh.
Disney owning so much of the film and TV industry has been a terrible development for the plurality of media. Microsoft aren't as bad in enforcing their particular worldview on the world, but still everyone should be uneasy about a handful of companies controlling the landscape - whether that's Tencent, Microsoft or Sony.
A reminder that at the end of the day these are all giant corporations, and the 'competition' as we perceive it doesn't really matter when a giant cheque can be ripped out to change the game at a moment's notice.
It's a long term plan to make GamePass/xCloud the dominant force in gaming. So, they lose money in the short term, gain in the long term. And Microsoft can afford to wait.
Strongly doubt it. Similar was said when MS bought Bethesda.
During the "Bethesda Joins Xbox" roundtable on March 11, Spencer addressed speculation around whether the acquisition will see future Bethesda titles, such as Starfield and The Elder Scrolls 6, becoming Xbox exclusives – and it's not good news for PS5 players.
"If you’re an Xbox customer, the thing I want you to know is that this is about delivering great exclusive games for you that ship on platforms where Game Pass exists," Spencer explained. "That’s our goal, that’s why we’re doing this, that’s the root of this partnership that we’re building.
"Obviously I can’t sit here and say every Bethesda game is exclusive, because we know that’s not true," Spencer said. "There are contractual obligations that we’re going to see through, as we always do in every one of these instances. We have games that exist on other platforms, and we’re gonna go support those games on the platforms they’re on. There are communities of players and we love those communities and we’ll continue to invest in them. And even in the future, there might be things that have contractual things or legacy on different platforms that we’ll go do."
So things like Deathloop they had to allow on PS5 with the timed exclusivity because that deal was already in place. But if there's nothing contractually in place, they're going to be Xbox exclusives. Same will more than likely happen with ActiBlizz.
Would it not make them more money to keep ps players in the loop though ther than cut out that user base from all the new software?
Too much money in the COD franchise to make it console and PC exclusive. But i agree with one of the above posters, maybe they're thinking outside of the console box and more a conglomerate gaming streaming service.
Yep.
I would be very surprised if Activision games are not released on Playstation. I think this will continue as normal.
The difference will be that Playstation owners will pay 70 quid a game and Xbox owners will get it as part of their monthly sub, and probably earlier access.
I bet there'll be a Game Pass app on PS5 before the end of the year.
I would imagine best case scenario for someone who is solely playing on Playstation is that Sony just give up the race to the bottom and allow a gamepass cloud streaming app on playstation. At least with this and future game releases its the best case.
Wow.
Oh wait, thats a parody account. Derp
...
I've said before that I think it's a great thing when Sony/MS buy smaller studios they may or may not have had a strong existing relationship with, empower them to create new games and franchises and help build those studios up. Likewise, Sony/MS doing a deal with big studios to have them make a game exclusively for them is also fine.
Sony/MS buying existing huge studios where that studio's games would have been coming out on both systems for years, is more about taking those franchises away from the competitor than about providing something for your own system. The majority of the franchises MS got with Bethesda and now that they'll get with Activision-Blizzard are ones that would have historically been on Playstation as well.
This move is ludicrous. I can't fault MS for doing it, because they have the warchest to do it. But man, talk about pay to win....
SO game pass just went from being the netflix of gaming to being the disney+ of gaming
There's so many thoughts on this but what's sticking out in my mind as a sort of oh that stings thought is that the last call of duty on a playstation console will be "call of duty vanguard" Also what happens to live service titles like Warzone, do they just stop on playstation full stop?
There is also the other route
Microsoft gets so big on the software side and game pass makes them so much money that they opt out of the dedicated console making business. The xbox turns into a sort of pseudo entry level entertainment PC and they push game pass onto every format they can.
At first glance, it's really not good for the console industry.
Even worse, I had people on Reddit screaming at me for suggesting Starfield would be an Xbox console exclusive.
XbOx HaZ nO ExClUsIvEs As YoU cAn PlAy On Pc🙄
Jesus christ, this company is too large to fathom
Now begins the narrative of some gamers who'll claim that future releases won't be Xbox/Game Pass console exclusives.
Nope.
Yeah that seems to be their only option. They have nowhere near the amount of money that Microsoft have to buy other studios
Sony will go down the route of strong first party titles, but i hope they dont go the way of Sega.
It feels like Sony is getting suffocated slowly, they don't have the alternate revenue streams or datacenter infrastructure to keep up with the industry anymore, may be time for them to go for a more Nintendo like approach with very strong first party titles used to shift less powerful hardware.
Wow, huge move! Thankfully Acti/Blizzard have no games that I'd miss except Tony Hawk which looks like they already killed off. Imagine COD exclusive to xbox and free* on gamepass. Now that would shift a few units.
It's alright though, Sony are about to announceh that they are merging PS Now with PS Plus so.... who needs xbox :(
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But think how all the game pass subscribes will benefit!!
Bobby will be given a golden handshake and sent on his way, to fester on some tropical island.
Holy Christ this is ludicrious, they pretty much own multi platform titles and if the rumoured ubisoft being offered on gamepass as well, what else is there for them to buy.
I would be an advocate of xbox and especially gamepass but this is nuts
Is Bobby Kotick out the door then?
Either way, the end result is that gamers will suffer. As a PC player, I won't see much if any impact. But for a PS gamer, they could see themselves cut off from a lot of franchises.
Stick your Demon's Souls remaster Sony fanboys. Xbox is getting a Sekiro remaster!
Honestly I think if there is an antitrust lawsuit that the US supreme court would drop it if MS promise to use this new acquisition to remaster Mechwarrior 2 and Mechwarrior 2: Mercenaries.
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