PS5 vs. Switch vs. XBOXSX - THUNDERDOME Version 2.0

[TorqueDog]

Hah, wow, I was not expecting to wake up to that news.

https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2022/01/...rosoft-gaming/

Upon close, we will offer as many Activision Blizzard games as we can within Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass, both new titles and games from Activision Blizzard’s incredible catalog. We also announced today that Game Pass now has more than 25 million subscribers. As always, we look forward to continuing to add more value and more great games to Game Pass.

[Raekwon]

If I psend 68 Billion on a company I don't want the baggage of a CEO in a sexual harassments suit, seems odd to keep him on.

[LockedOut]

This is getting crazy with companies acquiring other companies. Good for Game Pass I guess if you like Call of Duty. Too bad Kotick is still there though.

[bomber317]

Dumb question here as I'm not up to speed on the game development industry

Will this be good for the quality of future games?

[OutOfTheCube]

I hope it leads to MS to diversify their lineup a bit... it seems in recent years Activision has just moved everyone to being CoD or CoD support studios. Obviously that's the crown jewel of the acquisition but Activision has some other great IP that looks like it was about to be ignored forever.

Still, crazy huge news again from MS. Clearly the strategy for them going forward is to just cut the third part support from under Playstation by buying them all. Sony is going to have to respond with a major acquisition themselves at some point.

[Inferno]

Maybe now I can play on PC Game Pass all of the CODs that I never did buy and won't buy because Activision tried to sell 5+ year old games for the price of new releases.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by OutOfTheCube

I hope it leads to MS to diversify their lineup a bit... it seems in recent years Activision has just moved everyone to being CoD or CoD support studios. Obviously that's the crown jewel of the acquisition but Activision has some other great IP that looks like it was about to be ignored forever.

Still, crazy huge news again from MS. Clearly the strategy for them going forward is to just cut the third part support from under Playstation by buying them all. Sony is going to have to respond with a major acquisition themselves at some point.

I don't think Sony has the means to shell out $70 billion acquisitions like Microsoft can. I'm kind of surprised that Microsoft is getting so aggressive after being pretty stagnant last generation. They are putting themselves in a position to dominate future generations. Sony has some great 1st party exclusives but not enough and you can only milk the same franchises for so long before they run their course.

[chemgear]

Originally Posted by Raekwon

If I psend 68 Billion on a company I don't want the baggage of a CEO in a sexual harassments suit, seems odd to keep him on.

Given the horrific harassments, hopefully this ends up helping to clean some of that up. Though I can only assume that the CEO gets a ton of money and even more money to finally "leave" down the road.

[Mazrim]

Originally Posted by chemgear

Given the horrific harassments, hopefully this ends up helping to clean some of that up. Though I can only assume that the CEO gets a ton of money and even more money to finally "leave" down the road.

Hopefully he's kicked to the curb the instant the deal is fully approved and finalized. It's rounding error worth of money on a $70 billion deal.

[SuperMatt18]

Originally Posted by OutOfTheCube

I hope it leads to MS to diversify their lineup a bit... it seems in recent years Activision has just moved everyone to being CoD or CoD support studios. Obviously that's the crown jewel of the acquisition but Activision has some other great IP that looks like it was about to be ignored forever.

Still, crazy huge news again from MS. Clearly the strategy for them going forward is to just cut the third part support from under Playstation by buying them all. Sony is going to have to respond with a major acquisition themselves at some point.

Yeah it might be bad for industry as a whole in terms of competition between Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo .

BUT I think this is actually good for Activision / Blizzard games and that company as a whole.

I think Microsoft will be less worried about every game needing to be a Billion dollar franchise, won'd be as focused on everything being about COD, and I could see Microsoft being interested in franchises like Crash, Tony Hawk, Spyro, etc seeing the light of day again as Gamepass titles.

Also wonder how long it takes for WOW to make it's way to XBox now.

If we see Sony respond I could easily see them buying Square Enix now.

[OutOfTheCube]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

I don't think Sony has the means to shell out $70 billion acquisitions like Microsoft can. I'm kind of surprised that Microsoft is getting so aggressive after being pretty stagnant last generation. They are putting themselves in a position to dominate future generations. Sony has some great 1st party exclusives but not enough and you can only milk the same franchises for so long before they run their course.

Maybe not an acquisition at this level, but there's honestly not many acquisitions even available at this level. What would be the next biggest, Take Two to get GTA exclusive? It's the only IP out there on the same level as CoD.

But if they did something smaller like a Sega / Capcom and straight up buying From Software that would offset some of the loss. You can't make up for losing CoD but you can stop the bleeding.

I just don't want them to grab Square Enix, I like their output on Switch.

[The Yen Man]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

I don't think Sony has the means to shell out $70 billion acquisitions like Microsoft can. I'm kind of surprised that Microsoft is getting so aggressive after being pretty stagnant last generation. They are putting themselves in a position to dominate future generations. Sony has some great 1st party exclusives but not enough and you can only milk the same franchises for so long before they run their course.

I am guessing the long term vision of MS is to have Gamepass be cross platform, and be the Netflix equivalent to gaming. Except in this case, they pretty much control a huge chunk of the content. So to them, it wouldn't matter if a person has Gamepass on a Sony, Nintendo, or MS console, as long as they are paying the monthly fee to use their service.

[LockedOut]

If your a Sony exclusive guy and you don't play Call of Duty I don't think your losing out at all. Activision is just Call of Duty and Blizzard is a shell of it's former self and just makes stinkers. Having MS run Activision may change things but this is years down the line if anything changes.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by The Yen Man

I am guessing the long term vision of MS is to have Gamepass be cross platform, and be the Netflix equivalent to gaming. Except in this case, they pretty much control a huge chunk of the content. So to them, it wouldn't matter if a person has Gamepass on a Sony, Nintendo, or MS console, as long as they are paying the monthly fee to use their service.

I agree although knowing the Japanese they would loath putting a Microsoft service on their machines. This affects Sony much more. Nintendo will always have their niche.

[photon]

Originally Posted by Inferno

Maybe now I can play on PC Game Pass all of the CODs that I never did buy and won't buy because Activision tried to sell 5+ year old games for the price of new releases.

This. I made the mistake of spending $40 on Black Ops Cold War, I only wanted the single player part and it felt worth about 1/4 of that. What a waste of $.

[The Yen Man]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

I agree although knowing the Japanese they would loath putting a Microsoft service on their machines. This affects Sony much more. Nintendo will always have their niche.

Maybe Sony does their own version of Gamepass, but with Japanese and Asian titles. It will be like Disney vs. Netflix.

I feel like Square Enix would be a company they'd be interested in. Sony already pretty much bought all the anime studios, might as well monopolize the Japanese gaming studios too.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by The Yen Man

Maybe Sony does their own version of Gamepass, but with Japanese and Asian titles. It will be like Disney vs. Netflix.

I feel like Square Enix would be a company they'd be interested in. Sony already pretty much bought all the anime studios, might as well monopolize the Japanese gaming studios too.

Do Square Enix games sell to the younger generations of gamers? My teenage boys have no idea what Final Fantasy is nor are they into that type of game. I just feel those games cater to an aging fan base. I don't see them as system sellers in North America today.

[TorqueDog]

Originally Posted by Raekwon

If I psend 68 Billion on a company I don't want the baggage of a CEO in a sexual harassments suit, seems odd to keep him on.

If you read between the lines on the announcement, Kotick's probably gone once the deal closes.

[OutOfTheCube]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

Do Square Enix games sell to the younger generations of gamers? My teenage boys have no idea what Final Fantasy is nor are they into that type of game. I just feel those games cater to an aging fan base. I don't see them as system sellers in North America today.

This sounds more like a parenting problem than a Square Enix problem

[dammage79]

So Microsoft now owns Diablo and Doom and the Elder scrolls?

IDGAF about CoD or anything else like that.

Imagine a cross up with Diablo and the Elder scrolls.

Now let's just hope they can get the upcoming releases of those titles done properly. Doubtful but it'd be nice.