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Axios: Microsoft's Phil Spencer: Activision deal "well beyond anything I’ve ever done"

kingfey

Banned
I am not following your point. They had a lot of IP?

They weren't an Activison or Bethesda. Sorry. Compare their IP to big hitters of their day. Not exactly the same as CoD or Skyrim. They were really small IP.
IP is not worth a damn, if you arent making it.

These games on other hand, were from different studios. Psygnosis was their publisher. That is much a bigger issue than just owning activision. It meant that all these games had to come to playstation console, if psygnosis wants to publish them, giving other developers no option but to accept it.
 
Again, see the post above. That's my entire point. Buying Acitivision is enormous. Buying Psygnosis in 1993 is a drop in the bucket.



The whole point of the argument was whether or not the situation of Sony buying Psygnosis is the same as Microsoft buying Activision. It is not. There were plenty of gaming only companies that could have purchased Psygnosis.

Only Microsoft or another tech giant has the ability to purchase someone like Activision.
And at the time only Sony could even think of blowing $48 million on acquisitions.

Yes Activision is more important. But really the only difference is scale. The strategy is exactly the same. Out spend the competition. Take 3rd party games from the competition. Undercut on price. Start first party dev, but it will take years before its competitive.
 
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The whole point of the argument was whether or not the situation of Sony buying Psygnosis is the same as Microsoft buying Activision. It is not. There were plenty of gaming only companies that could have purchased Psygnosis.

Only Microsoft or another tech giant has the ability to purchase someone like Activision.
But it was. Only Sony or another tech giant (of that time) had th ability to purchase someone like Psygnosis.

At that time the whole console market revenue was 19b (Sony's revenue at that was around 4b too for comparison). Now it is 10 times bigger.
 
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And at the time only Sony could even think of blowing $48 million on acquisitions.

Yes Activision is more important. But really the only difference is scale. The strategy is exactly the same. Out spend the competition. Take 3rd party games from the competition. Undercut on price.

But it was. Only Sony or another tech giant (of that time) had th ability to purchase someone like Psygnosis.

At that time the whole console market revenue was 19B. Now it is 10 times bigger.

Nope. Nintendo was, for instance, many multiples beyond this in terms of valuation. They could have easily acquired a gaming publisher for $48 million.
 
Nope. Nintendo was, for instance, many multiples beyond this in terms of valuation. They could have easily acquired a gaming publisher for $48 million.
What? Nintendo had around 8b market cap in 1996 (could not find earlier data but used Yahoo stock prices to compare them with 1996 and 2022), while Sony had around 45b in 1996.

We need to compare revenues though, but I don't have such data. Anyway, Psygnosis acquisition was huge comparatively to the gaming market that time.
 
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What? Nintendo had around 8b market cap in 1996 (could not find earlier data but used Yahoo stock prices to compare them with 1996 and 2022), while Sony had around 45b in 1996.

We need to compare revenues though, but I don't have such data. Anyway, Psygnosis acquisition was huge comparatively to the gaming market that time.

Nintendo was valued somewhere around 100x Pysgnosis at the time. They could have purchased them.

Sony cannot purchase Activision.
 
What? Nintendo had around 8b market cap in 1996 (could not find earlier data but used Yahoo stock prices to compare them with 1996 and 2022), while Sony had around 45b in 1996.

We need to compare revenues though, but I don't have such data. Anyway, Psygnosis acquisition was huge comparatively to the gaming market that time.
It was a new strategy at the time for gaming also. Nintendo was trying to push organic growth, and still are for the most part.

Sony had no real first party capability and had to buy it. They didn't really have many noteworthy games except Gran Turismo. God of War and Shadow of the Collusus were impressive on ps2. Ps3 saw the rise of naughty dog. Only on ps4 after 15 years were they regularly putting out top tier material most of the time. And even then they still buy tons of timed and permanent exclusives.
 
Nintendo was trying to push organic growth, and still are for the most part.
Oof, Nintendo of that era was crazy. I heard some stories. Insane!

Sony had no real first party capability and had to buy it. They didn't really have many noteworthy games except Gran Turismo. God of War and Shadow of the Collusus were impressive on ps2. Ps3 saw the rise of naughty dog. Only on ps4 after 15 years were they regularly putting out top tier material most of the time. And even then they still buy tons of timed and permanent exclusives.
Sony relied heavily on third parties. Capcom, Konami etc. were all working for Sony basically at that time.

Sony cannot purchase Activision.
Yes. So? (They probably wish they were)
 
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Oof, Nintendo of that era was crazy. I heard some stories. Insane!


Sony relied heavily on third parties. Capcom, Konami etc. were all working for Sony basically at that time.


Yes. So? (They probably wish they were)

That was the entire point of my discussion.

Microsoft is now acting upon an industry in which competitors in that industry cannot compete in terms of acquisitions. There are no gaming, or even gaming-focused companies (Sony isn't purely gaming) that can buy Activision

You have to essentially be a big tech company with hundreds of billions in market cap, if not trillions, to compete at the same scale.
 
That was the entire point of my discussion.

Microsoft is now acting upon an industry in which competitors in that industry cannot compete in terms of acquisitions. There are no gaming, or even gaming-focused companies (Sony isn't purely gaming) that can buy Activision

You have to essentially be a big tech company with hundreds of billions in market cap, if not trillions, to compete at the same scale.
Every one of your posts boils down to "it's not fair". No shit, life isn't fair and it never will be. Time to get over it.
 

kingfey

Banned
That was the entire point of my discussion.

Microsoft is now acting upon an industry in which competitors in that industry cannot compete in terms of acquisitions. There are no gaming, or even gaming-focused companies (Sony isn't purely gaming) that can buy Activision

You have to essentially be a big tech company with hundreds of billions in market cap, if not trillions, to compete at the same scale.
That is just plainly false. Its not MS fault that the gaming industry is expensive. Its not their fault that they are trillion dollar company, and Sony isnt.
The industry dictates the market price. And MS has the money to buy then. Still, That doesn't mean MS would buy every gaming publisher.

MS still has other competitors. they have to compete with apple, amazon, and apple in other sectors. They cant casually spend tons of money like crazy.

What you should be worried about is the foreign company, which doesnt have anti-trust laws. you know TenCent, which can buy tons of publishers, and US cant do jack shit about them. Those guys can buy tons of publishers, and no one can stop them, not even the mighty USA.
 
That was the entire point of my discussion.

Microsoft is now acting upon an industry in which competitors in that industry cannot compete in terms of acquisitions. There are no gaming, or even gaming-focused companies (Sony isn't purely gaming) that can buy Activision

You have to essentially be a big tech company with hundreds of billions in market cap, if not trillions, to compete at the same scale.
And there is no other company than Sony in gaming that can flex their market share and connections to get various exclusive deals from various publishers and studios.

Each company has its own strength, and Microsoft finally started to use its own. Hope Microsoft buys Capcom. Meltdowns would be glorious.
 
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GhostOfTsu

Banned
Do you understand how big is a publisher?
Publishers have tons of connection in the gaming industries. Owning one of them, can bring you tons of customers to your system. The games they publish, can land on your system. That is how important publishers are,

Even Bethesda was a publisher during that era.

Except they were. Though with PS1 I believe they became bigger and had like 40% of video games sales in Europe. Imagine owning 40% of the whole european market. It is like having 4 top charting games across the europe.


For me I tend to judge the current position regarding specific area like gaming for example and if some people start playing victim card too hard, I just pinpoint on history.
Absolute BS. The 40% figure is from 1996 and Sony bought them in 1993. Psygnosis were still a multiplatform publisher until 1998 or something (even on Sega!). They had NO big IPs.

Name me even 1 big IP that they stole from Sega or Nintendo? They were an extremely small publisher with nothing of value after Amiga or Commodor 64.

I know you're all getting your facts from Xbox Twitter. They've been rewriting history like crazy the last weeks.

Sega were already dead when the PS2 came out like 2 years later. Sony didn't even have to lift a finger. They killed themselves.

Nintendo were stuck with cartridges when Square needed THREE cds for Final Fantasy 7. They had to switch development to Playstation. Blame Nintendo.

Another thing, Xbox DIDN'T WANT GTA on Xbox. Blame MS for that lol

 
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And there is no other company in gaming that can flex their market share and connections to get various exclusive deals from various publishers and studios.
Each company has its own strength, and Microsoft finally started to use its own.
And what do they want MS to do anyway, artificially limit what they can do to succeed because Sony fanboys are "concerned"? I mean c'mon. Sony and MS are both companies taking consumer money in a capitalist marketplace, they both are conglomerates with multiple divisions not related to gaming. It just so happens that MS is far more successful at their other products than Sony is. Tough shit.
 
Every one of your posts boils down to "it's not fair". No shit, life isn't fair and it never will be. Time to get over it.

Nope, you just didnt read my posts. It's a free market. I am not complaining about it other than I don't have to be a fan of it and don't think it's good for the industry. But it is what it is.

I am just pointing out how such a purchase could be argued is highly monopolistic. I still think the acquisition will get through, but the market is pricing in a decent chance it may not.

That is just plainly false. Its not MS fault that the gaming industry is expensive. Its not their fault that they are trillion dollar company, and Sony isnt.
The industry dictates the market price. And MS has the money to buy then. Still, That doesn't mean MS would buy every gaming publisher.

MS still has other competitors. they have to compete with apple, amazon, and apple in other sectors. They cant casually spend tons of money like crazy.

What you should be worried about is the foreign company, which doesnt have anti-trust laws. you know TenCent, which can buy tons of publishers, and US cant do jack shit about them. Those guys can buy tons of publishers, and no one can stop them, not even the mighty USA.

Ummm....what? It's not Microsoft's fault they are the only ones with the means to buy huge swaths of publishers? Oh, so sorry for them that this is the case. I'm sure they are really sorry for being in that sort of position.

Straw man argument. I'm less worried about Tencent than I am Microsoft. Tencent has more incentive to have neutral positions with respect to which platform a game arrives on. Microsoft doesn't. Why is tencent some terrible company? Their stake in multiple gaming companies hasn't been to the detriment of others, as far as I'm aware. Can't make the same claim with Microsoft.

And there is no other company than Sony in gaming that can flex their market share and connections to get various exclusive deals from various publishers and studios.

Each company has its own strength, and Microsoft finally started to use its own. Hope Microsoft buys Capcom. Meltdowns would be glorious.

That's not true. Microsoft is no stranger to that game. Neither is Nintendo. They all do it.

Completely false argument.
 
And what do they want MS to do anyway, artificially limit what they can do to succeed because Sony fanboys are "concerned"?
Anecdotally that one of the most common takes that "MS should compete fair with Sony" (while not having market share of Sony lol)
Though of course what they dream of is Microsoft leaving console gaming altogether (or live in its own niche somewhere).


That's not true. Microsoft is no stranger to that game. Neither is Nintendo. They all do it.
Nintendo does not even get big third party games anymore (though they started little by little and with potentially new Switch they could get something in the future, but that would be Sony's headache at this point).
No stranger to what? Microsoft doesn't have that market share and unlike Sony, they receive a backlash on any big third party exclusive game (I remember that RoTR case). Since then Microsoft stopped doing that altogether. I am not sure what Xbox 360 era Microsoft got time exclusivity though (considering that PS arrived 1 year later).

Now that can put the games on Game Pass and nobody will be offended as nobody loses the game anyway.
 
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RevGaming

Member
Someone must be drunk if thinks Sony would sell PlayStation. And that Nintendo, smaller them, would be able to buy them.

I wasn't being serious on happening. It was a what if.

Sony will buy Lady Dimitrescu ownership and it's over for MS.
 

DaGwaphics

Member
Psygnosis was still a small outlet compared to what we have today. And even their size back then was nothing enormous. Sony purchased them for a mere $48M in 1993. Adjusted for inflation, that is $86M today. Even assuming Sony were able to compound the company at a historical rate of 10%, they would be worth $840M. Or slightly more than, say, someone like Remedy. But Sony didn't, they closed the studio and is an example of one of their bigger failings.

Activision would basically be the equivalent of more than 100X Psygnosis purchases

You're not allowing for the growth in the gaming sector after that, gaming was still small potatoes in 1993. It was the PS1 that started gaming on the path it is on today. In market share 1993 Psygnosis was bigger than 2022 Activision.
 
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Anecdotally that one of the most common takes that "MS should compete fair with Sony" (while not having market share of Sony lol)
Though of course what they dream of is Microsoft leaving console gaming altogether (or live in its own niche somewhere).



Nintendo does not even get big third party games anymore (though they started little by little and with potentially new Switch they could get something in the future, but that would be Sony's headache at this point).
No stranger to what? Microsoft doesn't have that market share and unlike Sony, they receive a backlash on any big third party exclusive game (I remember that RoTR case). Since then Microsoft stopped doing that altogether. I am not sure what Xbox 360 era Microsoft got time exclusivity though (considering that PS arrived 1 year later).

Now that can put the games on Game Pass and nobody will be offended as nobody loses the game anyway.

Nintendo got a Monster Hunter Switch exclusive. In the past, they have gotten exclusives from Square. Microsoft had plenty of exclusive deals in the past, most notably in the 360 era. They certainly could go after them more now but may be less inclined in terms of cost benefit, but if they can buy 70B publishers they could buy any exclusive they want in all honesty.

You're not allowing for the growth in the gaming sector after that, gaming was still small potatoes in 1993. It was the PS1 that started gaming on the path it is on today. In market share 1993 Psygnosis was bigger than 2022 Activision.

Please provide proof. That's not even the argument. The argument is the scale and whether a gaming focused entity could buy Psygnosis and operate completely within that industry. They could have. Nintendo was more than capable.
 
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DaGwaphics

Member
Please provide proof. That's not even the argument. The argument is the scale and whether a gaming focused entity could buy Psygnosis and operate completely within that industry. They could have. Nintendo was more than capable.

I'm just going off of what has been stated here. If they were publishing 40% of the European gaming market in 1993, they were bigger by % than Activision today. I've never followed much news on them so have no idea myself.

Edit: I'll say after a bit of research that nothing they published before 1993 was particularly memorable (maybe lemmings), so, I'll rescind my comments on this one. :messenger_winking_tongue:
 
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GhostOfTsu

Banned
No stranger to what? Microsoft doesn't have that market share and unlike Sony, they receive a backlash on any big third party exclusive game (I remember that RoTR case). Since then Microsoft stopped doing that altogether. I am not sure what Xbox 360 era Microsoft got time exclusivity though (considering that PS arrived 1 year later).

Now that can put the games on Game Pass and nobody will be offended as nobody loses the game anyway.
You must be kidding. Mass Effect series, Bioshock, Dead Rising 1 and 3 (permanent), Oblivion, Ninja Gaiden 2, The Last Remnant, Tales of Vesperia.

COD DLC, GTA DLC, Skyrim DLC etc

They started this between Sony and MS. Remember that Sony was almost bankrupt at the time too.
 
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kingfey

Banned
Absolute BS. The 40% figure is from 1996 and Sony bought them in 1993. Psygnosis were still a multiplatform publisher until 1998 or something (even on Sega!). They had NO big IPs.
Why are people obsessed with IPs? What did that do for Sony and MS during xbox one and ps4?
Seriously, MS was dried as rotten flesh, with those big IPs in their storage. Sony had to abandon Killzone to make horizon zero down. And they are making a sequel for that. Sucker punch dropped infamous IPs, and made GOT. Even bethesda isnt making a Skyrim sequel. Ips are not worth anything, if you arent making games about them.

What Sony got was a huge publisher, which had tons of connection to 3rd party studios. That connection helped the PlayStation become stable house power console. Without that publisher, not alot of developers would have made games for ps1. That is how powerful they are.

Name me even 1 big IP that they stole from Sega or Nintendo? They were an extremely small publisher with nothing of value after Amiga or Commodor 64.
Every 3rd party publishers which Psygnosis helped publish their games. You know the games, that used to come one those consoles, were now going to that console.

I know you're all getting your facts from Xbox Twitter. They've been rewriting history like crazy the last weeks.
Learn the past first. We all hate twitter here. They are dumb brain farts.

Sega were already dead when the PS2 came out like 2 years later. Sony didn't even have to lift a finger. They killed themselves.
Sega had tons of misfortune. No one can deny that. Losing 3rd party games was a part of their demise.

Nintendo were stuck with cartridges when Square needed THREE cds for Final Fantasy 7. They had to switch development to Playstation. Blame Nintendo.
By forcing studios to use CD/DVD rom. The one Sony corporate unveiled with the help of Denon.

Chuck, it's time for you to go back to your safespace on xboxera acquisition thread and keep your bs there.
You are the only using this language here.

None of us is happy with these acquisition. That is how the market operates. The rich buys the poor. It happened all around the world.
 

yurinka

Member
And MS has the money to buy then. Still, That doesn't mean MS would buy every gaming publisher.
And doesn't mean they would want to sell to MS.

Those guys can buy tons of publishers, and no one can stop them, not even the mighty USA.
They can buy if the publishers want to sell. And in the case of they want to sell, then if they would want to sell to MS.
 

kingfey

Banned
And doesn't mean they would want to sell to MS.
Correct. They have to agree to them first. Nintendo laughed at MS face.

They can buy if the publishers want to sell. And in the case of they want to sell, then if they would want to sell to MS.
Its all about money. Whoever offers big money, is what they will go with. Some studios might prefer other companies though. If anyone would buy cdpr, i think they would choose MS, because they are the ones who helped them alot during Witcher 2, and didnt take their cyberpunk game from their store.
 

GhostOfTsu

Banned
I'm just going off of what has been stated here. If they were publishing 40% of the European gaming market in 1993, they were bigger by % than Activision today. I've never followed much news on them so have no idea myself.
It's not true that figure is from 1995-1996 and Sony bought them in 1993. They were still multiplatform for years. The market was so small even 40% in Europe was nothing anyway.
 

kingfey

Banned
Ummm....what? It's not Microsoft's fault they are the only ones with the means to buy huge swaths of publishers? Oh, so sorry for them that this is the case. I'm sure they are really sorry for being in that sort of position.
Activision went to Facebook. They straight up ignored MS and went for Facebook. That is the gaming market for you. If Facebook accepted activision deal, they would have owned them. MS was last option for activision.

Straw man argument. I'm less worried about Tencent than I am Microsoft. Tencent has more incentive to have neutral positions with respect to which platform a game arrives on. Microsoft doesn't. Why is tencent some terrible company? Their stake in multiple gaming companies hasn't been to the detriment of others, as far as I'm aware. Can't make the same claim with Microsoft.
You should be worried more about them. MS has the anti-trust laws in the US. Tencent doesnt have that luxury. They can buy alot of foreign studios, without no consequences. And they are backed by the chinese government. Any studio or publisher that doesnt exist in the US, is open road for them. They can snag them easily, and not face a monopoly at all.
Sony was a monopoly during ps2 era, and not one peep from US, because they were foreign company.
 

kingfey

Banned
Xbox ended the 3rd in the x360/ps3 gen. It only had a head start because started the first one, many big publishers needed to go multi due to rising game development costs and PS3 made many big mistakes.
Xbox was the dominant in that era. They sold less against the giant that was Ps2, and sold 80+m after that. You dont do those numbers against bigger competitor. Not to mention, they had alot of exclusives such as the witcher 2, and early access to COD dlcs.
 
Activision went to Facebook. They straight up ignored MS and went for Facebook. That is the gaming market for you. If Facebook accepted activision deal, they would have owned them. MS was last option for activision.


You should be worried more about them. MS has the anti-trust laws in the US. Tencent doesnt have that luxury. They can buy alot of foreign studios, without no consequences. And they are backed by the chinese government. Any studio or publisher that doesnt exist in the US, is open road for them. They can snag them easily, and not face a monopoly at all.
Sony was a monopoly during ps2 era, and not one peep from US, because they were foreign company.

Oh sure, the weak "anti trust" laws in the US. China has actually been far more harsh in terms of striking down companies from getting too big than the US has.

foreign companies still have to play by foreign rules when it comes to acquisitions.

Again, I am less concerned about Tencent or even Facebook than I am about MS. The former two companies wouldn't have taken their products off their main rival since they have no platform to wall off.
 
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kingfey

Banned
Oh sure, the weak "anti trust" laws in the US. China has actually been far more harsh in terms of striking down companies from getting too big than the US has.
Companies that dont submit to their rules. China authority has clear goal. You side with them, or you face consequences.

foreign companies still have to play by foreign rules when it comes to acquisitions.
Not the same thing as US laws.

Again, I am less concerned about Tencent or even Facebook than I am about MS. The former two companies wouldn't have taken their products off their main rival since they have no platform to wall off.
MS have windows, which you can play their games on PC.
Facebook, and TenCent dont have a store. Facebook would make that publisher VR developers, for their metaverse. If you want these options, good for you.
 

SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
You ignoring PC players for a reason?
Are you ignoring switch players for a reason? Skyrim is on the switch.

It's because we are talking about consoles. PS4 and X1 sold 120 million and 50 million respectively leaving us with a 170 million install base. That makes PS4 userbase 70% of all console gamers. It's just math.

Bethesda has a big userbase on PC just like CD Project enjoys. And yet CoD is almost non-existent on PC. PS sales and revenue from warzone is roughly 70%. in line, with the console split.

They could put Starfield on PC, MAC, Ouya and iPad. Doesnt mean they are not locking out the biggest console base. That is a FACT. I cannot believe we are arguing about semantics.
 
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You must be kidding. Mass Effect series, Bioshock, Dead Rising 1 and 3 (permanent), Oblivion, Ninja Gaiden 2, The Last Remnant
Nah, as far as I recall - oof it's been some time ago - Mass Effect and Bioshock were not moneyhats. Microsoft essentially did them like second party (or whatevert it is called when you pay for the development) and then allowed to port to other platform due to the games being huge success (at that time Microsoft still operated under the generous "you can own IP" rule).
COD DLC, GTA DLC, Skyrim DLC etc
COD DLC I guess is the same deal as Sony's COD deal where it just goes to the most popular platform or something.
GTA DLC is an interesting case BTW. As far as I remember Take 2 was in a huge trouble that time and did not have money to complete the DLC (or whole GTA4 game? No sure). Considering BGS and Sony's relationships I am surprised that it even got DLC considering how crappy PS3 version was.

In case of Sony they literally pay for the game not to be released on other platforms. Even if they did not finance the development at all.
They started this between Sony and MS. Remember that Sony was almost bankrupt at the time too.
Sony came to the market 1 year late and their Cell engine was a huge headache at that time.

Its all about money. Whoever offers big money, is what they will go with. Some studios might prefer other companies though. If anyone would buy cdpr, i think they would choose MS, because they are the ones who helped them alot during Witcher 2, and didnt take their cyberpunk game from their store.
Any public company goes to the highest bidder though.
 
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SlimySnake

Flashless at the Golden Globes
Nintendo was never at risk of being pushed out of the industry.

And Sega failed by their own poor choices.

But I do agree that it's not like Sony is exempt from stuff like this, but the scale at which Microsoft is operating on today is absolutely unprecedented and you can't be serious equating buying a 70B company to anything Sony has done in the past. It's not equivocal at all.
Nah, Sony used to do big exclusives like GTA, Final Fantasy and MGS. Of course they never acquired those companies and I think they probably shouldve when they had the chance. But the idea is the same. Keep content off of other consoles. They both went about it in different ways which frankly doesnt matter.

You and I have talked about Sony a lot. I have been infuriated by Sony's lack of investment in the console space since they hit it big with the PS4. They simply failed to see how big gaming would become even when they pretty much won the generation in the first 6 months. They shut down studios instead of reopening old ones. They kept their team sizes awfully small. no idea why Bend and Sucker Punch had to make do with just 100 devs. And they took forever to acquire Insomniac, Bluepoint and Housemarque. Kojima is still available. Why? Just make him an offer he cant refuse. Gaming is the next frontier. You think Microsoft is tough to outbid, wait till Disney and Apple join the party.

Soyn has found themselves backed into a corner where they have to spend billions just to get one big studio. It is simply unsustainable. Had they invested in studios back in the PS2 or even in internal studios the PS4 days, we would be seeing a much more secure future for Sony. They had laid such a great groundwork with games like KZ2, MAG, Resistance 2, Warhawk, and Socom Confrontation, and then completely dropped them all when they shouldve been doubling down on them. Everyone from Epic to Respawn to Infinity Ward and PUBG managed to find success in battle royale. Who knows, maybe sony wouldve made it big with at least one of those devs.
 
Nah, as far as I recall - oof it's been some time ago - Mass Effect and Bioshock were not moneyhats. Microsoft essentially did them like second party (or whatevert it is called when you pay for the development) and then allowed to port to other platform due to the games being huge success (at that time Microsoft still operated under the generous "you can own IP" rule).

COD DLC I guess is the same deal as Sony's COD deal where it just goes to the most popular platform or something.
GTA DLC is an interesting case BTW. As far as I remember Take 2 was in a huge trouble that time and did not have money to complete the DLC (or whole GTA4 game? No sure). Considering BGS and Sony's relationships I am surprised that it even got DLC considering how crappy PS3 version was.

In case of Sony they literally pay for the game not to be released on other platforms. Even if they did not finance the development at all.

Sony came to the market 1 year late and their Cell engine was a huge headache at that time.


Any public company goes to the highest bidder though.
MS basically cultivated the entire creation of console wrpgs. Bioware was only a pc dev, same with Bethesda. They made the first consoles similar to pc. I doubt Bioware would have even been able to put their game on ps3. It wasn't ported until ea ported it on a totally different engine. Oblivion was broke on ps3 forever. Valve famously declined to put anything on ps3 for years.
 
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Snake29

RSI Employee of the Year
Its odd you say Xbox aint going for the pinnacle of visuals, but then you list games where they are..?

Also starfield is not going to be a visual slouch the in game footage is showing higher geometric, detail and ray traced like reflections ( as noted by DF).

Also expect great visuals from Fable, avowed.

So thats

Gears 6
Perfect dark
Hellbalde 2
Fable
Starfield
Avowed

All going for state of the art visuals.

Thats more then sony has announced...
So the actual reality is that its sony are now behind on state of the art.
Spiderman 2 and wolverine are the only announced PS5 exclusives.

I think it's MS that is announcing games way to early. Games like Avowed or that game from Rare that is already in devhell. Sony behind? nah they will announce way more games for both PS5 and VR. They do not have to follow MS to announce games that are 6 years away from now.
 
MS basically cultivated the entire creation of console wrpgs. Bioware was only a pc dev, same with Bethesda. They made the first consoles similar to pc. I doubt Bioware would have even been able to put their game on ps3. It wasn't ported until ea ported it on a totally different engine. Oblivion was broke on ps3 forever. Valve famously declined to put anything on ps3 for years.
I remember that Mass Effect was ported quite some time later to PS3, right?

MS basically cultivated the entire creation of console wrpgs.
I presume FPS genre on consoles too
 
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yurinka

Member
Xbox was the dominant in that era. They sold less against the giant that was Ps2, and sold 80+m after that. You dont do those numbers against bigger competitor. Not to mention, they had alot of exclusives such as the witcher 2, and early access to COD dlcs.
No, Xbox never dominated any generation. PS2 destroyed the original Xbox and the other ones on their generation.

PS3 started way later than 360 specially on the main PS market, Europe, giving 360 a head start. Launch aligning them PS3 keeps selling better year after year and ends outselling 360 by a small difference once everything it's done. Wii oulsold both. Both PS3 and Wii (and DS if we include portables) outsold the 360. 360 wasn't dominant that generation, the opposite: it was the one who ended with the lowest amount of sales of the ganeration.

In the past generation PS4 kept outselling aboutt 2:1 XBO. Switch started years later but its peak year was when the covid bump so skyrocketed sales and went from having a pretty similar launch aligned sales curve compared to PS4 to keep selling faster, to a point that in the next year or so will outsell PS4. The covid peak happened when PS4 was already sunseting and transitioning their manufacturing to PS5, and chips started to supply constrain both PS4 and PS5. The chips supply issue may be over too late to allow PS4 make a comeback. So it's almost sure that Switch will end being the top selling console of this generation, also benefited from having the monopoly of the portable consoles.

PS5 and Series X are severely impacted by the chips supply, so we can't still see this gen where it's more demand and sales seem to favor PS5 pretty much in line with previous gen (PS has an insane 111 MAU, seems the PS4 who don't upgrade to PS5 aren't going anywhere) but it's more related to the amount of consoles that each company is allowed to manufacture depending on chips availability.
 
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kingfey

Banned
MS basically cultivated the entire creation of console wrpgs. Bioware was only a pc dev, same with Bethesda. They made the first consoles similar to pc. I doubt Bioware would have even been able to put their game on ps3. It wasn't ported until ea ported it on a totally different engine. Oblivion was broke on ps3 forever. Valve famously declined to put anything on ps3 for years.
people are ignoring this part. MS is the reason why West RPG are popular. They made bethesda release marrowind on a console. Which made next instalment easy to port to other consoles. Without xbox, we wouldnt have all our beloved wrpg games. And if they were doing the tiny bits of Sony behavior at that time, most of these IPs would have been xbox exclusive.
 

ManaByte

Member
360 wasn't dominant that generation, the opposite: it was the one who ended with the lowest amount of sales of the ganeration.

Even Jack Tretton, who ran SCEA at the time, compared taking over Sony in that generation to being the captain of the Titanic.
 
No, Xbox never dominated any generation. PS2 destroyed the original Xbox and the other ones on their generation.

PS3 started way later than 360 specially on the main PS market, Europe, giving 360 a head start. Launch aligning them PS3 keeps selling better year after year and ends outselling 360 by a small difference once everything it's done. Wii oulsold both. Both PS3 and Wii (and DS if we include portables) outsold the 360. 360 wasn't dominant that generation, the opposite: it was the one who ended with the lowest amount of sales of the ganeration.
PS3 was a complete disaster for Sony. Just looking at LTD console sales really doesn't cut it here lmao. The rest of your analysis seems solid though.
 

kingfey

Banned
No, Xbox never dominated any generation. PS2 destroyed the original Xbox and the other ones on their generation.
Ps2 was the king,

PS3 started way later than 360 specially on the main PS market, Europe, giving 360 a head start. Launch aligning them PS3 keeps selling better year after year and ends outselling 360 by a small difference once everything it's done. Wii oulsold both. Both PS3 and Wii (and DS if we include portables) outsold the 360. 360 wasn't dominant that generation, the opposite: it was the one who ended with the lowest amount of sales of the ganeration.
Ps3 had ps2 hype. and X360 sold 80+m, while ps3 sold 86m late. That was no competition, that was annihilation. ps2 sold 155m world wide, and lost half of them. There was no competition at all.

In the past generation PS4 kept outselling aboutt 2:1 XBO. Switch started years later but its peak year was when the covid bump so skyrocketed sales and went from having a pretty similar launch aligned sales curve compared to PS4 to keep selling faster, to a point that in the next year or so will outsell PS4. The covid peak happened when PS4 was already sunseting and transitioning their manufacturing to PS5, and chips started to supply constrain both PS4 and PS5. The chips supply issue may be over too late to allow PS4 make a comeback. So it's almost sure that Switch will end being the top selling console of this generation, also benefited from having the monopoly of the portable consoles.
Xbox one had major failure, which gave ps4 huge advantage. If xbox one didnt have that incident, they would have neck to neck.

Current gen is different. Neither is competing against each other anymore. Ps5 hardware sales is useless against xbox, because of the day1 pc sales. Its useless, because of the xcloud. You could say, xbox went above, and joined new realm with these 2 options.
 

DaGwaphics

Member
Are you ignoring switch players for a reason? Skyrim is on the switch.

It's because we are talking about consoles. PS4 and X1 sold 120 million and 50 million respectively leaving us with a 170 million install base. That makes PS4 userbase 70% of all console gamers. It's just math.

Bethesda has a big userbase on PC just like CD Project enjoys. And yet CoD is almost non-existent on PC. PS sales and revenue from warzone is roughly 70%. in line, with the console split.

They could put Starfield on PC, MAC, Ouya and iPad. Doesnt mean they are not locking out the biggest console base. That is a FACT. I cannot believe we are arguing about semantics.

All games aren't the same statistically. Bethesda games do most of their sales on PC and Xbox has lead historically in the console area with them. Not every game holds the split. Sony doesn't even hold the 70% mark on Destiny 2.
 

Sosokrates

Report me if I continue to console war
I think it's MS that is announcing games way to early. Games like Avowed or that game from Rare that is already in devhell. Sony behind? nah they will announce way more games for both PS5 and VR. They do not have to follow MS to announce games that are 6 years away from now.

Id rather know that games are coming then not know.
 

yurinka

Member
PS3 was a complete disaster for Sony. Just looking at LTD console sales really doesn't cut it here lmao. The rest of your analysis seems solid though.
Yes, PS3 and specially its launch was a total mess:
-Relased way later than MS specially on the main PS market
-Priced way too high
-It was even way more expensive to produce it, causing massive sales to Sony
-Launch line-up featturing the popular giant enemy crab and no big hits
-Extraterrestial hardware and tools, super difficult to use for dev
-Forced gyroscope motion controls as the only control in some launch window games ruining stuff like Motorstorm (later patched to allow proper controls) or Lair
-3rd parties started to go multi due to rising dev costs, and instead of money hatting GTA, FF, Devil May Cry or Tekken to stay, they moneyhatted crap like Lair, Haze and PS Move crap and even created a 'metaverse'

They were lucky that later they kept fixing many of these issues and they started to get many amazing exclusives like LBP, Killzone, Uncharted or TLOU series, and that we the Europeans bought whatever they made. Here even the PS4 at 599€ and the PSVita performed well.

Current gen is different. Neither is competing against each other anymore. Ps5 hardware sales is useless against xbox, because of the day1 pc sales. Its useless, because of the xcloud. You could say, xbox went above, and joined new realm with these 2 options.
They will continue being direct competitors, but even after the Zenimax and Activision acquisitions will continue making less revenue than Sony. Specially considering Bethesda and Activision Blizzard games will drop their revenue due to many of their copies of new games being included in GP at launch instead of being sold at full price, and will drop even more if they decide to keep some big Zenimax/ABK game out of PS.

Their game subscriptions will become more similar to each other and will fight harder to see who gets what there. MS already invested hard on mobile with Minecraft, King and CoD Mobile, and Sony bought the dev that makes their only mobile game, but that generates over $1B/year and will continue buying big mobile stuff. I think MS will be more dominant on more neutral territories like PC and mobile where they area diluted between many other players while Sony will be more dominant on consoles (hardware sales, total game sales, exclusive sales, average metacritic or awards etc), game subscriptions and VR.

Even Jack Tretton, who ran SCEA at the time, compared taking over Sony in that generation to being the captain of the Titanic.
It's funny to see people from USA talking as if USA is the world, or as if the rest of the world -or the rest of America- wouldn't exist. He only was in charge of a regional division of SCE, not the whole SCE, PlayStation or Sony. USA isn't the world, it was less than a third of the market for Sony. Their hardware sales heroes who saved the crap selling a shit ton of consoles were the European ones, commanded there by a guy called Jim Ryan. Jack sadly left the ship, Jim got promoted to CEO of SIE.
 
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