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MS's Response to Sony's "No AAA Studio Can Match CoD" Statement + Confirms Sony Pays To Blocks Games From Game Pass

Pallas

Gold Member
Why would you say something so controversial yet so brave.




Don't get fooled by the CoD messaging, the most lucrative part of Activision Blizzard is King, which makes multiple billions with the least amount of money put in.

If MS gets a choice of one of the three, they will probably choose to keep King.
Been reading through all of these posts, still haven’t finished but wanted to reply to this. I feel like everyone(mostly) thinks this acquisition was mainly for CoD but King is low key the real money maker now. Candy Crush games pull in a insane amount of money and they nailed the casual market so well with their mobile games.
 

Kagey K

Banned
Been reading through all of these posts, still haven’t finished but wanted to reply to this. I feel like everyone(mostly) thinks this acquisition was mainly for CoD but King is low key the real money maker now. Candy Crush games pull in a insane amount of money and they nailed the casual market so well with their mobile games.
There are a lot of IPs that King could use to try get crossover mobile recognition with Xbox.
 

DeepEnigma

Gold Member
Sony and Microsoft are both exaggerating. They have corporate lawyers they pay a ton of money to exaggerate every single issue. If Sony were the one merging with Activision then MS would exaggerate and complain just as much. Corporations doing what corporations do.
Inglourious Basterds Bingo GIF
 

64bitmodels

Reverse groomer.
I truly wonder which pc gamers prefer

Truly one and the same (again)
Studio gets bought/moneyhatted by Sony: games will only be on Playstation, maybe PC if they feel like it
Studio gets bought/moneyhatted by Nintendo: games will only be on Nintendo.
Studio gets bought/moneyhatted by Microsoft: Games will be on Gamepass (PERMANENTLY i should mention, the games will never get taken off so long as MS owns the company), Xbox, PC, switch and playstation ports are likely, etc

But yes, do call us one and the same for not wanting exclusivity and wanting people to play more games... This is why i don't mind MS moneyhatting because at the end of the day, games will still come to more platforms. Hell, a game can launch multiplat and still come to gamepass day one. This is as opposed to literally preventing people from being able to play games on other platforms for years on end because exclusivity is literally the only thing your console offers
 
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StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
Studio gets bought/moneyhatted by Sony: games will only be on Playstation, maybe PC if they feel like it
Studio gets bought/moneyhatted by Nintendo: games will only be on Nintendo.
Studio gets bought/moneyhatted by Microsoft: Games will be on Gamepass, Xbox, PC, switch and playstation ports are likely, etc

But yes, do call us one and the same for not wanting exclusivity and wanting people to play more games... This is why i don't mind MS moneyhatting because at the end of the day, games will still come to more platforms. Hell, a game can launch multiplat and still come to gamepass day one. This is as opposed to literally preventing people from being able to play games on other platforms for years on end because exclusivity is literally the only thing your console offers
Yup.

Exclusives and deals can happen by any one of them. But there's no doubt MS is the best option for availability for any console gamer. Aside from some games which are dedicated console/PC only (like Age of Empires is a PC only game), all the rest of MS games come out on PC. And by the looks of it day one on PC along with Xbox.

Nintendo and Sony are traditional walled garden ecosystems. Nintendo is actually the worst of them all. Luckily they hardly buy up studios.
 

Kagey K

Banned
Yup.

Exclusives and deals can happen by any one of them. But there's no doubt MS is the best option for availability for any console gamer. Aside from some games which are dedicated console/PC only (like Age of Empires is a PC only game), all the rest of MS games come out on PC. And by the looks of it day one on PC along with Xbox.

Nintendo and Sony are traditional walled garden ecosystems. Nintendo is actually the worst of them all. Luckily they hardly buy up studios.
But Sony only got strong armed into charging for online play because MS did it, then they only got strong armed to release games on PC because MS did it. Then they only offered a subscription service because MS did it

Poor little market leader.
 

fallingdove

Member
Studio gets bought/moneyhatted by Microsoft: Games will be on Gamepass (PERMANENTLY i should mention, the games will never get taken off so long as MS owns the company), Xbox, PC, switch and playstation ports are likely, etc

But yes, do call us one and the same for not wanting exclusivity and wanting people to play more games... This is why i don't mind MS moneyhatting because at the end of the day, games will still come to more platforms. Hell, a game can launch multiplat and still come to gamepass day one. This is as opposed to literally preventing people from being able to play games on other platforms for years on end because exclusivity is literally the only thing your console offers
This not even remotely how this works. Microsoft has money hatted games for generations. Purchasing entire publishers is much more egregious. They now very well that if they publicly declared that as soon as contractual agreements were up that they would stop supporting development on competing platforms that the Actiblizzard acquisition would immediately fall apart.

Also - super naive of you to think that 1st party Gamepass games will be there forever. Digital rights are never guaranteed, especially when there are hefty capital expenditures associated with storing games that few people are playing. Good luck with you subscription based future.
 
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Kagey K

Banned
This not even remotely how this works. Microsoft has money hatted games for generations. Purchasing entire publishers is much more egregious. They now very well that if they publicly declared that as soon as contractual agreements were up that they would stop supporting development on competing platforms that the Actiblizzard acquisition would immediately fall apart.
Let's say you are right.

Is this better or worse than Sony paying developers they don't own from never releasing games on Xbox?
 

64bitmodels

Reverse groomer.
You’re kidding yourself if you think that Microsoft would spend 8 billion dollars and invest hundreds of millions to produce these games only to put them on competing platforms.
They spent 70 billion only to put COD on everything, so... yeah
Also, Starfield on Switch? don't think that would happen even IF a port were announced, but go off ig lmao

And again to make comparisons to Sony, i'd say a game being exclusive to PC + Xbox is far better than a game being only on PS4 and PS5. Just because Playstation is the most popular console platform doesn't mean everyone on earth owns one. I can say the same thing for an Xbox, but my argument doesn't hold up so well when you bring in PC. More gamers get to play games when Microsoft money hats, simple as. I'm not advocating for them to buy everything on earth, I'm just saying that if i had to choose between them and Sony/Nintendo buying... well you know what i would do (and before you ask... yes, i AM biased. I don't have a PS4 or a PS5)
 
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fallingdove

Member
Let's say you are right.

Is this better or worse than Sony paying developers they don't own from never releasing games on Xbox?
Much worse. It’s magnitudes more impactful when you loose access to (not just one game) but dozens of the biggest budget titles released each year. Multiply this by all of the other major acquisitions Microsoft has made and making comparisons to Sony or Nintendo’s investments is laughable.

I own all three platforms by the way so I don’t loose access to anything but these sorts of slime ball moves that Microsoft is know for paint a grim future for those that are disinterested in subscriptions or appreciate having access to the diversity of games that the big 3 offer.
 

Kagey K

Banned
Much worse. It’s magnitudes more impactful when you loose access to (not just one game) but dozens of the biggest budget titles released each year. Multiply this by all of the other major acquisitions Microsoft has made and making comparisons to Sony or Nintendo’s investments is laughable.

I own all three platforms by the way so I don’t loose access to anything but these sorts of slime ball moves that Microsoft is know for paint a grim future for those that are disinterested in subscriptions or appreciate having access to the diversity of games that the big 3 offer.
Didn't Sony buy more developers than Xbox recently and still use thier marketshare to buy timed exclusives?

Or did something radically shift that I missed?

It's hard to cry foul, while scooping up everything you can at the same time.
 
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fallingdove

Member
Didn't Sony buy more developers than Xbox recently and still use thier marketshare to buy timed exclusives?

Or did something radically shift that I missed?
The size and resources of these Sony acquired developers pale in comparison.

Also - I seriously doubt that market share advantage is playing a role in winning these exclusivity deals. Sony was just willing to pay more than Microsoft was.
 

Kagey K

Banned
The size and resources of these Sony acquired developers pale in comparison.

Also - I seriously doubt that market share advantage is playing a role in winning these exclusivity deals. Sony was just willing to pay more than Microsoft was.
Bulkshit.

If it's trying to compensate for lost sales, it was always going to be easier for Sony. Now not so much and it will cost them more.

It's really easy to argue for Sony, but when you try to argue against them, you can see why MS made the moves they did.
 

64bitmodels

Reverse groomer.
Much worse. It’s magnitudes more impactful when you loose access to (not just one game) but dozens of the biggest budget titles released each year.
I don't disagree. I'm not advocating for MS to moneyhat everything and purchase every single studio on planet earth. That's not how i roll. But, time and time again its been proven that when it's MS doing it over Sony the results usually tend to go to more platforms, and it's more favorable overall. When Sony moneyhats, it never comes to PC until like years later. When MS moneyhats, it's on PC and Xbox day one, and usually comes to other platforms later like in the case of Rivals of Aether, Cuphead, Ori, and Super Lucky's Tale. Even with outright acquisitons more gamers get to play.

Even then, let's see how this is going with MS current acquistions. They got double fine, yet Psychonauts 2 is Still on PS. Mojang was acquired in 2014, yet Minecraft is still on Playstation. They bought Zenimax, yet Ghostwire Tokyo and Deathloop still came over as PS5 exclusives, even after the acquisition. They're acquiring Activision, yet COD is still coming to Playstation (even if it's because it wouldn't be the most profitable decision)
The only game you can name that negatively got affected by MS's acquisitions is Starfield, which i can concede- that was a fucking dick move on MS's part.

I'm not trying to act like MS is doing this out of the good of their hearts either, they're a corporation like the rest of them. It's just that I think their plans are much more appealing than Sony and Nintendo's walled garden way of doing shit
 
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fallingdove

Member
They spent 70 billion only to put COD on everything, so... yeah
Also, Starfield on Switch? don't think that would happen even IF a port were announced, but go off ig lmao

And again to make comparisons to Sony, i'd say a game being exclusive to PC + Xbox is far better than a game being only on PS4 and PS5. Just because Playstation is the most popular console platform doesn't mean everyone on earth owns one. I can say the same thing for an Xbox, but my argument doesn't hold up so well when you bring in PC. More gamers get to play games when Microsoft money hats, simple as. I'm not advocating for them to buy everything on earth, I'm just saying that if i had to choose between them and Sony/Nintendo buying... well you know what i would do (and before you ask... yes, i AM biased. I don't have a PS4 or a PS5)
Don’t need to ask about your bias, your insufficient logic was a dead giveaway. :)

Also - a large majority of Sony money hats have made it to PC so I don’t know exactly what you are getting at. You are upset that 1st party games don’t make it to PC on day one?

Such a weird sense of entitlement that people have. Clearly Sony believe that the profitability of these high production value games require that they are first released on PS4/PS5. If a gamer believes they are missing out on a large number of 1st party Sony titles, they should buy a Sony console. They shouldn’t bitch and moan when the company doesn’t sacrifice to make them happy.
 

64bitmodels

Reverse groomer.
Also - a large majority of Sony money hats have made it to PC so I don’t know exactly what you are getting at. You are upset that 1st party games don’t make it to PC on day one?
Day one is where the majority of interest and sales are located, it still damages the platform anyways even if it's timed.
BTW, the difference between a Microsoft timed exclusive and a Sony timed exclusive is that one almost always comes to Playstation after the 6 month period is up, and the other usually hardly comes to Xbox while taking an eternity to come to PC and usually never appearing on Switch.
Such a weird sense of entitlement that people have. Clearly Sony believe that the profitability of these high production value games require that they are first released on PS4/PS5. If a gamer believes they are missing out on a large number of 1st party Sony titles, they should buy a Sony console. They shouldn’t bitch and moan when the company doesn’t sacrifice to make them happy.
I'd say i'm entitled to spiderman seeing as how every game before 2018 came to PC day one with 0 kicking or screaming. And Xbox. and whatever nintendo platform was contemporary of the time.
and by the way, if losing entire publishers worth of games is that big for a Playstation gamer, I'd suggest getting an Xbox. Except you don't even need to do that if you own a PC or literally anything that can stream through an internet connection. Tell me what place you can play Playstation exclusives other than a Playstation?
 
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fallingdove

Member
Bulkshit.

If it's trying to compensate for lost sales, it was always going to be easier for Sony. Now not so much and it will cost them more.

It's really easy to argue for Sony, but when you try to argue against them, you can see why MS made the moves they did.
But Microsoft has infinite amounts of money!!?

I think it’s a smart move for Microsoft. Historically they have had difficulty managing game development. With rare exception, they have typically delivered great games through acquisition. Gamepass will die without the steady production of great games, therefore their strategy required the acquisition of some major developers/publishers.
 

tmlDan

Member
Exactly. And that's the reason why I root for MS and not for Sony. The former makes their games available on basically every device. The latter is chaining their games to their own DRM box. Thankfully, Jimbo is slowly changing that.
Halo is not on PS. On PC you have to log into Xbox when you go on it, it's terrible - talk about DRM, at least PS has games on disk.

Stop acting like you prefer one because they're saints or something, it's massive BS - they're just as bad if not worse.
 

64bitmodels

Reverse groomer.
Wasn't it MS who bust on the scene with the Xbox 360 throwing money around for several timed exclusives as well as full exclusives.
Sony's been doing that shit since the first PS came out in 1994. Unless you've got some really good explanation for why Crash, Spyro, Klonoa, and Tomba all weren't on PC.
 
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fallingdove

Member
I'd say i'm entitled to spiderman seeing as how every game before 2018 came to PC day one with 0 kicking or screaming. And Xbox. and whatever nintendo platform was contemporary of the time.
and by the way, if losing entire publishers worth of games is that big for a Playstation gamer, I'd suggest getting an Xbox. Except you don't even need to do that if you own a PC or literally anything that can stream through an internet connection. Tell me what place you can play Playstation exclusives other than a Playstation?
Sony didn’t make the Spider-Man games prior to 2018 so what exactly is your argument? That you should have access to everything in the world that you are a fan of? Ok.

Exclusive should mean something maybe? You might not like the idea of PlayStation exclusives as a non-customer but as an owner of PlayStation consoles, Sony is investing in me for purchasing their devices.
 

StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
Exclusive should mean something maybe? You might not like the idea of PlayStation exclusives as a non-customer but as an owner of PlayStation consoles, Sony is investing in me for purchasing their devices.
Not lately.

Most of the key franchises are now on PC (or soon to be). And the PC version is better.
 

onesvenus

Member
Microsoft could pay to get every one of those same games on GamePass, without buying the Publisher outright. Why are you all acting as if MS had to spend $80 Billion to get a bunch of games on GamePass?
Let's not act as if there weren't some other company blocking those deals. As an example, REVIII not being in Gamepass is not a matter of Microsoft not wanting to pay more but of some other company removing that option from them. Microsoft would have to buy Capcom to avoid that happening.

Yeah. The reality is that all these acquisitions are cheered on because of tribalism. We can pretend it’s for some other reason but I’d say it’s bs. The reality is that MS could do Gamepass deals without owning them, like they do with A Plague Tale and like they did with Outriders.
Again, they can do it only with the games their biggest (and bigger) competitor allows them to. MS couldn't do CoD Gamepass deals even if they wanted to.
 

Fredrik

Member
Again, they can do it only with the games their biggest (and bigger) competitor allows them to. MS couldn't do CoD Gamepass deals even if they wanted to.
I don’t believe that, I think it’s just about money. If MS would’ve payed enough and if Activision Blizzard was okay with it I absolutely think they could’ve had CoD on Gamepass, no matter what Sony says.
 

Leyasu

Banned
Microsoft could pay to get every one of those same games on GamePass, without buying the Publisher outright. Why are you all acting as if MS had to spend $80 Billion to get a bunch of games on GamePass?

Perhaps, but then it would

A, most probably cost Microsoft more than the games cost to make to have them day one on their service. Why would they do that when the games are not exclusive? It’s okay for smaller games or new unproven I.P, but big franchises would be expensive.

B, be in a position where they have no control or guarantee that they would be able to put the next one on their service or if the next one is going to cost even more. They would be at the whim of the publishers.

Buying the I.P has become the strategy of for those who offer a subscription service for their content. Because it gives them an asset that they can do what they want with and removes someone else having power of their offerings.

Yeah. The reality is that all these acquisitions are cheered on because of tribalism. We can pretend it’s for some other reason but I’d say it’s bs. The reality is that MS could do Gamepass deals without owning them, like they do with A Plague Tale and like they did with Outriders.

The only upside I see from an acquisition is that Google or Amazon can’t buy them and lock the games to streaming only.

All three platform holders are quite happy to use their money block content from the others. If the strategy is to moneyhat exclusives or buy outright, and you are a fan of one but not the other, then you or they should check their console bias.
 

rnlval

Member
Much worse. It’s magnitudes more impactful when you loose access to (not just one game) but dozens of the biggest budget titles released each year. Multiply this by all of the other major acquisitions Microsoft has made and making comparisons to Sony or Nintendo’s investments is laughable.

I own all three platforms by the way so I don’t loose access to anything but these sorts of slime ball moves that Microsoft is know for paint a grim future for those that are disinterested in subscriptions or appreciate having access to the diversity of games that the big 3 offer.
Along with AMD/Intel, Microsoft supervises a unified multi-vendor hardware PC platform.

Sony focuses on software exclusivity with a solo hardware vendor i.e. Sony. Sony doesn't allow PlayStation hardware clones and is enforced by DRM walled garden.
 
I don’t believe that, I think it’s just about money. If MS would’ve payed enough and if Activision Blizzard was okay with it I absolutely think they could’ve had CoD on Gamepass, no matter what Sony says.

Well, look at the leaked RE8 agreement between Sony and Capcom, Sony cockblocked RE8 from Gamepass, don't you think Sony would try the same thing with CoD (if they haven't tried to do that already..)?
 

rnlval

Member
Exactly. And that's the reason why I root for MS and not for Sony. The former makes their games available on basically every device. The latter is chaining their games to their own DRM box. Thankfully, Jimbo is slowly changing that.
The main reason why I support MS is due to common hardware standard supervision with PC clones. Anyone can build a "Design for Windows" PC hardware that offers economic participation for multiple and diverse hardware vendors.

Android/ARM-based devices are dead-end door stops after the handset vendor stops supporting them and one Android/ARM build for a particular device doesn't work on another Android/ARM device.

Apple, Nintendo, and Sony are solo platform hardware vendors that disallow hardware clones.
 

onesvenus

Member
I don’t believe that, I think it’s just about money. If MS would’ve payed enough and if Activision Blizzard was okay with it I absolutely think they could’ve had CoD on Gamepass, no matter what Sony says.
Let's talk about the RE8 case because that's the only one we have looked at the contract (although I expect all Sony's marketing deals to be almost the same). Do you think Microsoft could go and pay double the amount and Capcom would break that contract? Really? It's not only a problem with money. If Sony has recurring deals (like the CoD one) no amount of money would change that
 

The_Mike

I cry about SonyGaf from my chair in Redmond, WA
The reason COD is such a money maker is because it's on all platforms. Microsoft wants to keep that money coming, they will not make it exclusive, however, you better believe that shit will be on Gamepass.
Yeah would be silly to make cod exclusive.

I mean, why would they make it exclusive, they don't have a console to sell or anything.
 

Ozriel

M$FT
Anybody believing Microsoft words is naive.
You don't buy a publisher with billions then continue to act like it was nothing and promise everything will be as before.
Are you stupid ?

Pathetic Microsoft.

Wut? The games will be on Gamepass. That’s not ‘same as before’. Looks like you should be directing your question at yourself.

Go back to the 360 gen then tell me....

Seeing people keep bringing up stuff a decade old as justification in these threads will never not be amusing.
 
giphy-downsized-large.gif


People labeling this as "Bad for the industry and must be stopped" are missing the point.

B...but...but we lose the little games in between says the same guy that thinks losing Sifu, FFVII remake and other moneyhat practices are ok, the latter has Z E R O benefits to gamers, it only benefits Playstation gamers whereas MS buying activision benefits us ALL.

Take a moment, analyze what you just said and apply it.
The question is, would people rather it was Meta that was the acquiring party? Would Meta making the acquisition lead to a more desirable outcome for gamers?

The answer to that is a resounding no. Meta would’ve used ActiBlizz as a means to satisfy their own ends. They would’ve stripped all franchises away from every platform and use them to satiate their own desires to expand their already failing “Meta”-verse(pun 100% intended"). Microsoft did everyone a favour by jumping in and out-bidding them. Playstation keeps Cod, Diablo & OverWatch only they lose marketing arrangements after their Marketing deal ends. New ips stay with xbox potentially, as they don't have the potential to blow up like already established ones. Microsoft is the better choice, Meta would've taken a whirlpool of terrible decisions and would end up ruining ActiBlizz. It's that, that some people don't understand.
 
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DETACA

Banned
The question is, would people rather it was Meta that was the acquiring party? Would Meta making the acquisition lead to a more desirable outcome for gamers?

The answer to that is a resounding no. Meta would’ve used ActiBlizz as a means to satisfy their own ends. They would’ve stripped all franchises away from every platform and use them to satiate their own desires to expand their already failing “Meta”-verse(pun 100% intended"). Microsoft did everyone a favour by jumping in and out-bidding them. Playstation keeps Cod, Diablo & OverWatch only they lose marketing arrangements after their Marketing deal ends. New ips stay with xbox potentially, as they don't have the potential to blow up like already established ones. Microsoft is the better choice, Meta would've taken a whirlpool of terrible decisions and would end up ruining ActiBlizz. It's that, that some people don't understand.

you nailed it!
 

John Wick

Member
Wut? The games will be on Gamepass. That’s not ‘same as before’. Looks like you should be directing your question at yourself.



Seeing people keep bringing up stuff a decade old as justification in these threads will never not be amusing.
It just shows when they were in a dominant position they cut the same deals. They obviously couldn't cut those deals without paying really big money last gen because PS was in the dominant position. That 1 year of exclusive Tomb Raider cost them a fortune. As the gen went on the harder it became to get those deals.
 

DETACA

Banned
It just shows when they were in a dominant position they cut the same deals. They obviously couldn't cut those deals without paying really big money last gen because PS was in the dominant position. That 1 year of exclusive Tomb Raider cost them a fortune. As the gen went on the harder it became to get those deals.
boom
 

Ozriel

M$FT
It just shows when they were in a dominant position they cut the same deals. They obviously couldn't cut those deals without paying really big money last gen because PS was in the dominant position. That 1 year of exclusive Tomb Raider cost them a fortune. As the gen went on the harder it became to get those deals.

Again, it’s old history at this point. Different management too. Makes no sense to bring up as a foil or excuse for recent anti-consumer activities.
 

phil_t98

#SonyToo
It just shows when they were in a dominant position they cut the same deals. They obviously couldn't cut those deals without paying really big money last gen because PS was in the dominant position. That 1 year of exclusive Tomb Raider cost them a fortune. As the gen went on the harder it became to get those deals.

agree with that, also it made more sense to release tomb raider a year later as it was going into the same window as uncharted which would of hammers tomb raider on PS
 

Clear

CliffyB's Cock Holster
This whole thing is such a trumped-up nothingburger.

If company A offers company B X amount of money for a period of exclusivity, the terms of that deal will lay out in precise detail what is meant by "exclusivity".
Naturally this will include all methods of publication and monetization outside of those offered by the exclusivity licensor, because that has an impact on the value of the deal.

The way a perfectly normal business transaction is being misrepresented as some sort of sinister act of anti-consumerism is pretty gross. Because literally anyone with half a brain for business knows how these deals work.
 
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