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Ubisoft says it can stay independent, but ‘would review any buyout offers’

cant see any value in them, ghost recon sucks now, there f2p games are awful, far cry isnt that big and is just cut and paste each time, what else assasins creed doesnt move huge units either.
 

Y0ssarian

Banned
Would love it if Sony gets them, lots of talent across the world and can be shifted around for any major release accelerating its progress. For around $10B I think they're cheap. They have both profitable GaaS and great SP games.

But in the process, keep them multiplatform just like Bungie.
I would prefer Sony buy Squeenix, Sega or Capcom. Don't waste the money on ubisoft 💩
 

Bo_Hazem

Banned
I would prefer Sony buy Squeenix, Sega or Capcom. Don't waste the money on ubisoft 💩

Why not all.

crowd talking GIF by South Park
 

Kerotan

Member
So they're basically saying they'd sell if whoever buys them keeps releasing games on all platforms. So they're not cunts like Bethesda.

Not sure if Sony would break the bank knowing this. They need to buy a publisher where they can threaten MS to make their games exclusive in return for getting Bethesda games and all Activision Blizzard games on their platform too.
 

Soapbox Killer

Grand Nagus
We hate it too. But 3rd party publishers these days, can't fund their games forever. There will come a time, where they would have to sell themselves.


Maybe they should redact some of the enormous budget they spend on these games and go smaller on project size.. (I could very well be talking out of my ass)


All these giant publishers don't seem to make enough "mid-level" "AA" games to fill in the gap. We need games that fit in the space between huge AAA blockbusters and Indie gems. Like "Fox Searchlight Pictures" in the movie business.
 

splattered

Member
If i would have heard this 5-10 years ago i'd say yeah do it! But anymore i am not really feeling their games for the most part. The Division and even barely that one... Far Cry used to be one of my favorite series but i havent even played 5 or 6 still. If i were MS or Sony i'd pass on this.
 

Saber

Gold Member
I honestly wouldn't mind...as long they get rid of the bad apples these companies have(like the woke and diversity bullcrap for instance).
 
I think it is funny when people bring up "afford" as if there was a true budget here.

It doesn't really work like that.

Can they find a financer willing to give them the appropriate rates and schedule in order to ensure their long-term future is solvent? The question is what can they afford not to buy?

If SIE's revenue/market share were to decrease, the ability to pay off its liabilities becomes much more difficult. Sony has always benefited from SIE, but they've never really doubled down on it. You see way larger acquisitions in other divisions (these divisions don't really have the R&D cost of SIE). It would not surprise me to see them take the gloves off and make a purchase of Take2 or several other publishers.

Take2, CDPR, Capcom, Kadokawa/FromSoftware, and maybe even Square Enix with smaller purchases of Kojima Productions, Ember Labs, Clap Hanz, being options as well.

It'll never be cheaper to buy companies than it is today and content will only become more expensive.

So there is little reason to wait on these purchases.

That being said you need to make sure you get return on your investment with these purchases. You aren't going to get anywhere close to ROI on purchases of companies like Ubi Soft. You just won't. The best thing for Ubi Soft to do is merge with another medium size publisher, reduce overhead, and focus on making quality titles.

Recall that Square Enix bought Eidos for like 121 million dollars and the Tomb Raider reboot probably paid for that purchase entirely. That's easy and quick ROI. Sony bought Insomniac for 229 million and Miles Morales has probably already paid for that purchase.

When you get into the billions though, it becomes more difficult to get that return. Microsoft will NEVER see a return on Activision. Just zero chance. I'll eat crow if I'm wrong, but I see this absolutely blowing up in their faces.

Square Enix has turned their merger around and turned it into a success despite my belief that their games suck now. Eidos played a large part in that.

Sega Sammy on the other hand has been a terrible merger. Bandai Namco has been a huge success.

We all hate Konami, but their company's market cap is at all time highs. A Konami, Ubi Soft merger probably makes some sense, with Konami managing. EA buying Ubi Soft or merging with Ubi Soft makes sense as well.
 

kingfey

Banned
Maybe they should redact some of the enormous budget they spend on these games and go smaller on project size.. (I could very well be talking out of my ass)


All these giant publishers don't seem to make enough "mid-level" "AA" games to fill in the gap. We need games that fit in the space between huge AAA blockbusters and Indie gems. Like "Fox Searchlight Pictures" in the movie business.
Problem is gamers don't buy these games. Most of AA games don't sell more than 3m. At most is 5m.

Plus if they do that, can lose potential clients.
 
I hope not, I’m getting really tired of this shit. It’s funny though since a few years ago they fought hard to fight off a Vivendi.
 

ethomaz

Banned
He even being the CEO has obligation to show the propose to the Board.
The Board decides the buyout and not him.
What he things or say about the subject is not important... of course he can still try to convince the Board to choose what he wants.
 
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Wildebeest

Member
Maybe they could make an Ubisoft NFT and get someone to buy the NFT for a few billion while having no control over the company.
 

John Wick

Member
I also think it's unlikely, but why would they "have" to be multiplatform?
Do you think MS will be allowed to continue just buying up multiplatform publishers? The FTC at some point will step in especially with what Sony stated with purchase of Bungie. If Sony, Nintendo and other companies complain it will be stopped in it's tracks.
 

Genx3

Member
Do you think MS will be allowed to continue just buying up multiplatform publishers? The FTC at some point will step in especially with what Sony stated with purchase of Bungie. If Sony, Nintendo and other companies complain it will be stopped in it's tracks.

They can complain all they want as long as it's not illegal they won't have a foot to stand on.
 

Genx3

Member
I imagine Xbox is under scrutiny with Microsoft. The amount of money they spent is extremely significant, even for a company the size of MS. It HAS to pay off, or heads will roll.

All those companies are an investment as long as they hold their value and continue being profitable as individual companies everything should be ok.
 
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yurinka

Member
He even being the CEO has obligation to show the propose to the Board.
The Board decides the buyout and not him.
What he things or say about the subject is not important... of course he can still try to convince the Board to choose what he wants.
The board of directors are the 5 Guillemot brothers, 3 employee representatives and 6 independent directors. The Guillemot family control their board of directors hired by them:

image.png


Do you think MS will be allowed to continue just buying up multiplatform publishers?
As long as they continue being far from become market leaders in any main gaming marlet and having a small market share they are very far from having any monopoly, so there's no reason to stop them.

But in the case of Ubisoft, they don't want to sell. Specially to companies who could ask them to modify their plans, strategy and vision.
 
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