This is really a tough one. I hate consolidation, but I also really hate Bobby Kottick.
this post was submitted on 11 Jul 2023
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Well, you're really gonna hate the fat pay out he gets.
He was always going to get it though
Yeah, in no version of how this played out was he going to not receive hundreds of millions of dollars. That was never an option.
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Kotick gets rewarded by the deal going through. Billions of dollars from the sale. Worst case for him after that is a few hundred million from a golden parachute if he's fired. We have no real reason to think he will (or won't, to be clear) be fired though, so there's a very real chance this is full reward for him: giant piles of money and continues to get to run Activision-Blizzard, just with Microsoft bosses above him.
The deal going through isn't something you want if you hate him.
He was filthy rich anyway, a few hundred million more doesn't make any difference. If the deal gets him out, then that's still a small win, despite Microsoft owning even more developers
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What's the point of all these lawsuits over mergers when every single time there is clearly a monopolistic merger it just goes through anyways.
The issue in this instance is that's its hard to prove that a company not even close to leading to the market is going to somehow dominate that market through a single (albeit large) acquisition.
It's not a "single" acquisition though. Microsoft have been acquiring huge companies (Bethesda, for example), hit games (Minecraft), and key development parters from competition (remember Rare?) from the beginning of Xbox.
To think that they spent all of those billions of dollars to buy out everything but that they aren't going to use that to benefit their platforms, is just crazy to me.
Just like they said in one of their internal emails, they are in a unique position to spend their competition out of business, and the entire industry will be worse for it.
Microsoft have been acquiring huge companies (Bethesda, for example), hit games (Minecraft), and key development parters from competition (remember Rare?) from the beginning of Xbox.
And yet, they are still in third place in the gaming market behind Sony and Nintendo. If those acquisitions didn't turn Microsoft into a monopoly already, what will be significantly different if they acquire AVB?
They're 3rd place this generation mainly because they release one big exclusive per year, like Redfall, which turns out to be utter dogshit. It's not because they don't have an actual treasure trove of IP to draw from or a lack of development resources.
While Nintendo is putting out games like Tears of the Kingdom, Microsoft produces boring, samey, minorly iterative crap year after year. Halo and Gears went from being Xbox icons to unsurprising announcements at formulaic E3 press conferences, because Microsoft only seems to know how to beat dead horses.
Let me ask you this simple question: how have gamers or the industry benefited from Microsoft's past acquisitions?
I can't see any way that allowing Microsoft to own (and probably squander) an ever-growing library of IP is good for me or anyone outside of the company.
Gamers benefited tremendously. GamePass is a game changer and having access to day 1 first (and often 3rd) party releases is amazing. Devs are happy too. Many publicly admitted that without GP some of their games would not launch at all.
While you are right that MS has released mostly duds this generation, it’s not fair to paint them as completely without any benefits to gamers or industry.
Yeah, gamers will definitely benefit greatly when GamePass becomes the only way to access certain new releases and they start upping the monthly price. This is every service subscription ever. Once they have the market lead they'll be free to up price, offer shittier service etc.
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I know people like GamePass, but I'm not sure that spending $17/mo to own nothing in the end is what I consider a win... Especially since GamePass feels like a prime example of Microsoft digging into their deep company pockets to outspend their competition with what seems to be an unsustainable loss-leader.
I also have no idea whether it benefits or hurts 3rd party developers.
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Theoretically, the way it works is each one of those sales should go through until you hit the one that would push them over the edge to monopoly. You don’t block a purchase because of purchases you expect them to make in the future (unless stuff has already been signed)
As much as I hate Activision Blizzard as a publisher and Bobby Kotick as a person, I feel this level of corporate consolidation is a terrible thing for the games industry and gamers.
There is so much more to this than CoD being on Playstation or not...
Well the good thing here is that there was several concessions MS has made in contracts to ensure it’s mitigated. That’s why it’s necessary to go through the trial even if it isn’t likely going to be in your favor. Small victories
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Oh great, more consolidation and monopoly building.
'Tis the era of Indy Games, my friend. Abandon the Graphically amazing games that cannot be built upon passion due to have dev teams of 10,000 strong. Instead, embrace the smaller titles developed by less than 10 people whom cry with joy at the prospect of showering you with entertainment and art.
You're saying this 3 weeks before BG3 drops lol
This is the best year for big studios in a loooong time
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As much as I hate Activision Blizzard as a publisher and Bobby Kotick as a person, I feel this level of corporate consolidation is a terrible thing for the games industry and gamers.
There is so much more to this than CoD being on Playstation or not...
Break Microsoft, Meta and Google. They will kill humanity
I don't care about "monopolies" and "consolidation"
I just care about the possibility of Guitar Hero being revived god dammit
Clone hero is fun.
I gave up on guitar hero after they implemented the greedy "tokens" model on GH: Live. It was very lame. You had to play a radio station of sorts to get tokens. Tokens could be used to play a song of your choice. When you ran out you had to play the radio station or buy more with real money lol.
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I know a lot of people (rightfully) are against it . But the way Activision/Blizzard has been run has been shambles and needs at least some kind of change. Plus the scrutiny has lead to several concessions by MS that will help curtail future antitrust issues for the most part.
They're run more effectively than Microsoft has run their gaming division for the past ~15 years or so... Microsoft's gaming leadership has seen one of the most valuable gaming IPs, Halo, flounder again and again and again. They closed all their game studios and spent a whole generation with minimal first party exclusives, they did I don't know how much damage to Arkane with Redfall...
More generally, Microsoft's approach to leading their game studios is to leave them to run the way the studio was ran pre-acquisition. Activision-Blizzard is not going to see major changes to the way they run if this deal does go through (pending CMA). Microsoft will Activision to be run the way it is now, and only intervene if profits dip too much (considering Halo, though, that might take quite the dip).
I don't get the assumption that Activision is going to see some major cleanup from this. They won't.
Well at least it's gonna clean up the really horrible practices at Activision Blizzard with all the SA allegations. MS is infinitely better for the workers than ABK.
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While I absolutely hate the fact that the gaming industry is being consolidated into a few massive corps, I am very excited for the entire Activision Blizzard umbrella to be under new leadership.
It's amazing to me how short-sighted this decision is. Yeah sure keep wide access to CoD for 10 years to get the FTC off their back and then watch all that fall away immediately after. For us this is potentially decent gains in the short term but certainly contributes to this industry turning to crap long term.
potentially decent gains in the short term but certainly contributes to this industry turning to crap long term.
Hmm where have I seen that before
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I hate this consolidation of the gaming market but Microsoft seems to not have sex pest as direct bosses so that’s a good thing… makes me feel less scummy if I buy d4
Wait until they set Edge as the default browser every time you start one of their games
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Fucking hell. We really need to shatter all these cancerous megacorps.
RIP any new blizzard games in the UK
UK will probably still get the games, they'll just go through different publishers.
The CMA agreed to negotiate so I think it's likely that a deal will be made soon. The UK doesn't want to be left out
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As far as poison goes, I'd much rather pick Phil Spencer over Bobby Kotick.
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Reminder that 343 is the only AAA studio that has never made a good game.
I don't have much faith in MS managing ActBlizz, and that's coming from someone who generally likes Microsoft stuff. From what they did to Ensemble, Bungie, Lionhead, and Rare (where is my Viva Pinata 2, Phil?), they are way too content to just buy their way into stuff and stumble through everything by tossing money everywhere. I don't think Phil Spencer is the right person to lead Xbox even if he is a "gamer", because Xbox had just been ran poorly for years on the studio side, and adding Activision Blizzard isn't going to improve things.
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I'm just hoping to get starcraft and Warcraft spinoffs out of this. Lots of potential with those IP's. Since 3 is never getting properly fixed, Warcraft 4 would also be nice.
Your expectations should be set on low. MS with their infinite money couldn't do shit with Battletech and Shadowrun, not to mention Rare.
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I'm very torn on this one, Microsoft becoming this big can't be good but Activision is such a dumpster fire that there is no way this doesn't help them get their shit together.
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