Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard
https://www.theverge.com/2023/7/11/23779039/microsoft-activision-blizzard-ftc-trial-win
From the article, quoting Judge Corley:
… the Court finds the FTC has not shown a likelihood it will prevail on its claim this particular vertical merger in this specific industry may substantially lessen competition. To the contrary, the record evidence points to more consumer access to Call of Duty and other Activision content. The motion for a preliminary injunction is therefore DENIED.
The consolidation of the gaming industry will be just another tale of oligopoly in a capitalist society I guess. Yaaay.
We’re heading towards the balkanization of all digital content, DRM is the method they will use to enforce their rule.
Piracy isn’t just moral at this stage, you’re obligated to participate as a means to resist.
Despite not pirating PC games due to not wanting to risk viruses I am very invested in the cracking scene, since they lead to positive outcomes of some companies removing DRM earlier if a crack comes out. Used to be they’d just be left in indefinitely. Thank you pirates.
Piracy against big corporations? Sure, but indie devs? That’s gonna hurt them far more and they usually haven’t done anything to uustify it
The indie industry is also growing a lot these days
Agreed, besides for a few companies in the triple A space the indie scene has grown so much to the point where I don’t feel like I’m missing out on great gameplay, stories, and/or graphics anymore.
Yeah, it’s exploded so much that compared to the past there’s an overwhelming amount of options now. It’s led to being harder to stand out and make a hit compared to the past, but also shows how much the barrier to entry has fallen.
Seriously though? They bought Bethesda and look what they’re doing there. Now they get to add another massive developer as if they weren’t already ridiculously huge? This monopoly stuff has to end. I don’t just mean gaming either. Like 5 companies control our entire food supply. There can only be one internet provider in any area. It’s insane.
This is the inevitable conclusion to free-market based economies. The market will pick winners, and those winners will then have a capital advantage over all new entrants, allowing them to outcompete anyone they want, and to use their size to control the market at large. It’s literally built into the system. The attempts at reform we try are rolled back eventually, and we end up in the same place again. Ma Bell broke up, and for a while we had competition across the industry and innovation. Eventually, market leaders were picked, and we end up where we are now, with few options, and little difference between the ones we have.
Oligopoly, not monopoly. Monopoly implies there’s just 1 company. In gaming there is far from one company.
- Whirlybird ( @Whirlybird@aussie.zone ) 7•2 years ago
This monopoly stuff has to end.
Microsoft aren’t a monopoly, especially in gaming. Even buying ABK they won’t be even remotely close to a monopoly.
MS isn’t even top 2 in a hardware market of 3. They’re not even top 4 in publishers either. Hardly a monopoly.
- argv_minus_one ( @argv_minus_one@beehaw.org ) 5•2 years ago
What did Microsoft do with Bethesda?
Bought them and made their games Microsoft exclusives.
- argv_minus_one ( @argv_minus_one@beehaw.org ) 4•2 years ago
Let’s be honest. Bethesda games have always been PC exclusives. All other platforms got an unfinished beta and PC got the real game.
On one hand this just means further consolidation of an already oligopolic industry. On the other hand, Activision is a terrible company run by a terrible man, so it’s not like things could get much worse.
It’s not really about Activision being bought though, it’s about Microsoft buying them.
I still don’t understand all the people who are cheering this on. Why is consolidation of the industry a good thing. Is it really just because you want the games on gamepass?
Edit: in retrospect, I do agree I would be happy to see the leadership be ousted from acti-blizz. Since the merger is happening, I may as well see the good in it (if they are indeed getting ousted, that remains to be seen). I do think it is a worrying trend overall though
It’s less the focus on consolidation and more getting out the very problematic leadership from Activision (Bobby and his crew). Not that Microsoft is a bastion of progressive thought or leadership, but it’s suspected they would be much less likely to have covered up things like the Cosby room, suicide due to harassment, or the theft of breast milk. Activision’s leadership has some deep seated problems with sexism in general.
Yeah this is how I feel. I don’t think that stopping this merger is going to make triple a games a much less hyper-capitalistic hellscape but I feel like forcing a change of hands might mean better conditions for the abk devs, because from what I’ve heard from friends that have worked at Microsoft’s studios they’ve got a decent track record for employee care. Nothing remarkable, mind, but if it gets the devs away from toxic hypermasculine leadership and also gives them more security to make better games, I’m willing to nod the merger along. ABK’s games have long had a human cost that I’m not super keen to see them continue to pay yknow
is there any indication that microsoft intends to clean house?
Like @Lockely@pawb.social mentions, they did intend to clean house by dropping the board with a buyout.
I, personally, am not too bothered by the consolidation of game studios. There are plenty of AAA game developers and indie devs are filling other niches (and sometimes become AAA themselves). It’s a different industry from something like making cars with high production costs and huge barriers to entry.
A ton of the shit comes straight from the board of directors, who will no longer have a board because MS is absorbing and buying out all shareholders.
We know Bobby is leaving for a fact as well, as he has a buyout clause in his contract.
Short term, this is excision of a cancer from the industry. Long term this kind of consolidation is bad for competition. I’ll be happy when MS gets inevitably trust busted.
I think that’s a fair perspective. The leadership there is very problematic and I would be glad to see them gone. I just hope the industry doesn’t continue down this path
People like my friend Dave, I guess. He’s got Game Pass practically for life (bought through one of those insane 'convert all your Xbox Gold time to Game Pass for $1" deals) and he wants as many “free” games as he can get. Like Call of Duty, last time he bought a Call of Duty game was probably 10 years ago, but he’s still very excited about the prospect of Call of Duty on Game Pass.
I think it may be from PC gamers who want PC ports day 1, so would rather if a company is bought out it be one that has made pushes for simultaneous pc and console day 1 releases than having to buy another hardware. But for gamers who are fine with playing on all system it does definitely make sense why this buy out is bad news, since competition is much more preferable.
Yeah, I have mixed feelings.
I would ideally like Blizzard to split from Activision and have their leadership replaced, but realistically, I don’t see a path to that happening, and I don’t imagine it could recreate the original Blizzard anyway. Talent has moved on. Circumstances have changed.
Meanwhile, although Microsoft has been a problematic giant for almost the entire history of personal computing, their problems (as far as I know) do not include routine abuse/harassment or silencing support of human rights on behalf of the Chinese government.
Given the choice between no change and this change, I think I prefer this change. I might actually play a Blizzard game again if it goes through.
A company I actively hate is being merged into a company that I tolerate. The level of scum coming from Microsoft doesn’t even compare to Bobby “exploit on a yearly basis” Kotick.
In general, I want a greater variety of products from a greater variety of developers/producers. Activision deserves to fucking die, and Microsoft hasn’t managed to develop any ire from me in the last 4-5 years. So, the nuance wins, and I am happy Microsoft won this specific case.
- Whirlybird ( @Whirlybird@aussie.zone ) 1•2 years ago
We want a more competitive landscape. Sony trouncing the competition isn’t the way to a good and healthy industry. This “consolidation” only harms people that refuse to buy an xbox or a pc or use game streaming services…so basically only people that will only buy a Playstation.
As primarily a Playstation and Nintendo gamer, I think this acquisition is going to be 99% bad news for me. Oh well.
Can I ask why? Microsoft has a monetary incentive to push the games to other platforms wherever possible. Yeah they may hold a few back (see Starfield) to try and sell consoles but I don’t expect them to withhold all. There were some interesting articles that this deal is more about the mobile gaming (King) rather than COD or other AB games.
As an Xbox and Nintendo owner I feel Sony/Nintendo have done more harm to the industry by reinforcing exclusives (both times and complete) than Microsoft. Wouldn’t it be in Microsoft’s right to do what the market leaders are doing and take advantage of exclusives to try and gain market share back? We also saw with testimony/discovery during the trial that Sony would often say one thing publicly and another internally. I think Sony only opposed this cause they wanted to stoke the fire of fandoms.
Microsoft are no longer interested in selling consoles necessarily, otherwise they’d be holding stuff back from PC as well. They’re interested in getting people into their ecosystem through Game Pass.
And while I agree with you that Sony and Nintendo have used plenty of anti-consumer practices, Microsoft has also done so in the past and I think the only reason they’ve been more pro-consumer of late is because they’ve been the underdog for a long time now. I would be anticipating a change in their behaviour the more people they get to subscribe to Game Pass, and this Activision-Blizzard deal is a huge step towards that.
- Whirlybird ( @Whirlybird@aussie.zone ) 4•2 years ago
Exactly. Sony have spent years leveraging their market leading position to further put them in the lead via paying to keep content and games off Xbox. Their market position is their strength and they leverage it. Microsoft’s strength is their financial power, and they’re now finally leveraging it. Sony need to be pulled back to the pack and pulled in line with their anti-consumer practices. The more market share and dominance they get the worse they get for consumers, as they’ve shown many times.
Sony has the superior hardware, and superior first party titles. Sony has often financed some third party development which keeps things playstation exclusives, but to my knowledge this has always been new IP not existing sequels like Microsoft has done in previous generations.
The only time Sony’s ever had stronger hardware was PS3, which was a dumpsterfire that never even ended in a profit. PS1 < NS4. PS2 < GCN. PS4 < Xbox One (by a small margin). PS5 < Xbox Series X.
The only thing they have to their name is a bit of code made for their platform and not others, and the opportunity to buy a $700 headset that’s outclassed by a standalone $400 headset.
The best thing that ever happened to Sony was a) Nintendo using cartridges to solidify FF as a PS franchise, and b) Sega marketing Nintendo as “for kids” back in the 90s, a stereotype they’ve never been able to get away from.
That is however, with the caveat that all Xbox games have to run on Series S as well.
And nearly all PS5 games have to run on PS4. I fail to see your point.
Not true. There are now current gen only games, and the Xbox Series S is current gen. It’s really become a problem. I think Balder’s Gate is getting delayed on Xbox because of problems running it on S. Microsoft doesn’t allow developers to support the X and not the S.
I didn’t say they had the highest specs on paper, I said they were superior, and I was talking about now.
The PS5 outperforms the Series X in most games despite having slightly worse specs on paper. But it’s basically the same. The fact that you can get a digital console for $400 and add a standard Nvme drive instead of a proprietary card makes the whole package way cheaper too.
But I’d you want to talk about past consoles, the N64 having a much faster CPU didn’t matter a ton when the limitations of carriage storage prevented or delayed a lot of third party titles. They did the same thing by using the mini disc in the game cube. Sony screwed this up during the PS3 era with how difficult it was to program for. But the 360 was defective, and the wii was under powered and pretty much broke them off to do their own thing. so that’s really a wash.
- argv_minus_one ( @argv_minus_one@beehaw.org ) 1•2 years ago
No console has had superior hardware since 1992. The release of the IBM VGA and Gravis UltraSound sealed the superiority of the PC, a title it has held ever since.
Phil Spencer said every single future Zenimax game is going to be exclusive, so it’s not just a few being held back.
Microsoft’s monetary incentive is to kill PlayStation and make everyone buy GamePass. Then they don’t have to put effort into making individual games, they’ll have your money anyway. They’ve shown for years that they don’t care about Xbox making money. They are propping up Xbox with profits from other parts of their business, something that’s usually considered anti-competitive, but that’s out the window these days.
Sony doesn’t buy games to keep them from their competition. Sony buys developers and talented people to make games. Throughout their history Destiny is the only game of note that they’ve purchased and neither it or Bungies next game are playstation exclusives. Every other developer had been largely making Sony exclusives games from the get-go, or didn’t being any existing titles of note with them.
Microsoft can’t run a studio or create IP. Forza is the only title of note that has been created in house. Everything else was done by outside creative and later bought and run into the ground. Could that change? Maybe, but it’s been 23 years and they have jack to show for it. Sony only has a few more years of development experience than Microsoft, but has destroyed them in the quality and quantity department.
The only way this could go well for consumers is if they could manage to negotiate fewer exclusives from both Microsoft and Sony, and I don’t see that happening because they’d likely rather gamble on the chance that their exclusive would be the big new IP that makes them billions. So we’re really just gonna see more games become exclusives.
It sucks. Exclusives are just bad for consumers, period. Doesn’t matter if it’s Nintendo, Sony, or Microsoft. They all just reduce how many options consumers have unless they’re willing to shell out hundreds for a new console. Personally, none of my consoles are chosen because of some trait of the console; they’re all just to play exclusives. Not even the Switch – I didn’t buy that to play games on the go or have motion controls. I bought it to play Animal Crossing and Zelda. If I could have played my Switch games (legally) elsewhere, I would have.
- argv_minus_one ( @argv_minus_one@beehaw.org ) 1•2 years ago
It’s ActiBlizz. You aren’t missing much.
As for Starfield, it’s a Bethesda game. Even if it weren’t exclusive to Microsoft platforms, you’d still be seriously missing out if you played it on anything other than PC. Bethesda games without mods, like sundaes without toppings, just aren’t complete.
So how long until Microsoft restricts all Activision or Blizzard games to being only on Xbox or PC?
im still waiting to play spider-man and god of war
I understand your point but its odd that you picked 2 games that aren’t PlayStation exclusives lol. Theyre on pc
I think they might go the other way and use it as leverage to push Sony to release cross platform games
Sony already does though, just on PC.
Only a handful of games and only after they are several years old. But not the whole franchise, so unless you have a PlayStation or had one in the past and played the other games in the franchise, you may be missing too much story to understand what’s going on.
Other than Spider-Man, it really feels like Sony coming out with games on PC is just to get you to buy a PlayStation to finish the franchise. Almost like a demo.
I appreciate what Sony has done, and I had a ton of fun playing Horizon Zero Dawn and Spider-Man, but as much as I want to play Uncharted, people tell me that I just can’t start from the end of that series. And I don’t really feel motivated to get God of War knowing they may wait 5+ years to put Valhalla on PC.
Yeah, Sony still is very much focused on pushing people to proprietary hardware. I’m glad they changed in some aspects as they saw the lost market potential of letting Microsoft dominate in the PC area. But, it is telling that if Sony bought a studio my first worry would be about games no longer being released day 1 on PC whereas that worry doesn’t exist for Microsoft. So Sony has improvements to make.
Destiny is the only game Sony has bought of note ever, and it’s not going exclusive, nor is Bungies next game. Sony buys talent, not game libraries.
- Whirlybird ( @Whirlybird@aussie.zone ) 2•2 years ago
Not to mention their PC titles have all been pretty bad ports.
At least they seem to be committed to fixing them. But yeah, with the reputation they have made for themselves, I definitely wouldn’t get any of their games at launch without reading lots of reviews. I did pick up Spider-Man at launch because the reviews seemed good, and I thought it was pretty damn solid of a port at launch. I wanted to get TLOU at launch, as I have never been able to play that game. But apparently it was a complete dumpster fire. I guess it has already improved a lot, but I already moved on to other games. I’ll get it when it goes on sale.
- Whirlybird ( @Whirlybird@aussie.zone ) 3•2 years ago
At least 10 years, likely never. Just like how Minecraft is still multiplatform on every device under the sun, COD/Diablo/etc will be too because that’s what their strength is - huge userbases.
10 years probably.
Boooo. Competition is always better in capitalism. Even Activision blizzard as terrible as they are, is competition. No one should be happy about this after how they’ve gobbled up a huge chunk of the gaming market.
How long until we’re forced to log into these games with Microsoft accounts and pay for Xbox live
Normally, I would not be happy about this, but this is the exception. Even as a Mac gamer (and please don’t at me - I have had decades of sass coming from the PC community. Let me enjoy my platform. I get what I need) this is a win. Activision was always poison for Blizzard. At the bare minimum, Microsoft will enforce corporate HR standards - may not be awesome standards, but it’s a lot better than Activision turning a blind eye. And it’s in Microsoft’s best interest to support native Mac development where it exists (and while I don’t see Blizzard ramping up their Mac dev team to previous (if meager) levels, I expect that the games I enjoy will continue to work fine on my machine, which is a modest ask.
I mean, if Microsoft bent over backwards to prop up Apple in those dark days (and you could have concussed me with a feather when Gates announced MS was investing in Apple IIRC on stage during an Apple keynote) they’ll support other platforms.
Should all gaming fall under several big umbrellas? No. But getting the Activision Board and C-suite out of the “day to day” of studio development can’t hurt.
From what I’ve heard, Blizzard’s C-suite and company culture was already poison before Activision. I’m not sure Microsoft will care about much more than getting a profit out of the deal.
Very true, but Microsoft doesn’t need any of them. And none of them are going to take a “demotion” to be a working executive - to off they toddle to ruin different companies (which is the life of Board members, flitting from Board to Board like human STDs in a pre-penicillin orgy). And Microsoft is big enough to put layers between their own disease and Blizzard - more like Vivaldi. Blizzard will be a small fish in a big pond, and that’s fine. Their best expansions (per many) were made when Blizzard wasn’t in a Board’s crosshairs.
Being a Mac gamer is like being a Linux gamer where even though the game isn’t officially supported it has way more of a chance to run than if it existed only on consoles. So if PC ports continue and Mac’s Game Porting tool improves like Proton has for Linux then hopefully Mac’s become more viable options for gaming as long as the game is on PC despite no attempts to make a native version.
Yeah. I was fine with Blizzard, since they had always developed natively for the Mac. I have to say that I was surprised to find that SE at least tried with their Wine port of FFXIV, and pleasantly surprised when they actually updated to the M chip.
That said, it is huge that Apple licensed the source code of Crossover from Codeweavers. I believe that the end result is basically going to be a game-specific “Rosetta for Windows” in which PC games will run seamlessly on a Mac (like FFXIV does), probably needing only an installer. And last I heard, MS was in talks with Apple regarding whatever gaming platform MS has - and it would absolutely be in MS best interested to tout “our platform [whatever this platform is, I am not deeply versed in the gaming scene] runs on Macs, so we’re not a monopoly."
I hope Mac’s entry into VR improves Mac gaming compatibility and support moving forward, but also hope it doesn’t lead to MacOS exclusives games since it seems like trying to get MacOS exclusive games would be more of a challenge to get working on Windows or Linux than it is the other way around.
It’s going to be years before the apple headset is meaningful enough to have exclusive anything. It has to coke down in price 4-5x and have several other must have apps. Gaming is still hardly worth the effort for studios to support on Mac or Linux.
I’d like to see this go through just to get Bobby Kotick out.
This is just the fight for the preliminary injunction. The FTC can still use antitrust proceedings to prevent/unwind the merger.
We often forget that big companies have been broken up before.
When was the last time that happened? It’s not really a thing anymore in our current environment.
I’m pretty sure there’s like 3 companies that own around 80% of the US grocery market. There’s a reason why avian flu drove the price of eggs up everywhere and its because one company owns the majority of egg production.
According to this article, in the US, it looks like 1982. It was AT&T. But it looks like they are currently trying to break up Meta.
I thought Microsoft had split too, but they mention that in the article and say they never actually split. I thought Intel was also split at one point, but it’s not listed here, so I’m probably wrong.
Microsoft lost an antitrust lawsuit a long time ago regarding making internet explorer a required part of Windows, so they had to allow other browsers in Windows for competition’s sake, but they didn’t get broken up. That might be what you are thinking of. I can’t think of anything Intel related though.
Antitrust suits result in more varied options than just breaking a company up. Microsoft had to have certain aspects of it’s operations supervised by the Department of Justice for years, and had to make mandatory changes with respect to browser bundling that only ended with Windows 10/11.
Intel has settled some antitrust actions – namely lawsuits by AMD – with money and cross-licensing agreements. They’ve spun off some divisions and operations over the years but none forced that I can recall.
Yes but I suspect it will be even harder to do then.
Depends on what you mean. It’s a more arduous process – but even if this injunction were granted that process would still play out unless Microsoft just decided to give up. But in another sense it’s not as high of a bar to reach as a preliminary injunction, which the court by process has to make certain assumptions with a presumptive bias towards the party not seeking the injunction.
What kind of games does Activision Blizzard release besides the obvious ones? COD, WOW, and Diablo? I mainly buy indie games but I know those are giant series.
Blizzard also has Overwatch, StarCraft, Heroes of the Storm, and Hearthstone.
I don’t really know the Activision side. I was a big Blizzard fan before learning about the Cosby room and their treatment of women in the workplace.
Crash Bandicoot, Spyro the Dragon, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, and Overwatch to name their most active IPs. But they’ve got also a massive back catalogue that’s not even vaguely being utilised right now.
They also published Sekiro
they also will be getting King, which makes Candy Crush, which makes about a bil a year
It would be funny if sony decided to release their games for pc only for linux, just to spite microsoft.
Slim chance of it happening, but one can dream.
I mean playstation runs on Linux…
The PlayStation operating system is based on FreeBSD.
It’s not. It’s a fork of FreeBSD.
That’s just because Microsoft is being nice, for now. In the future of they decide to change their tune, they can.