Topic: Do you think Microsoft should buy Ubisoft?

Ubisoft has a lot of financial problems, so their stock is very cheap at the moment. Do you think that Microsoft should buy them? Ubisoft has a lot of popular franchises like Assassin Creed, Far Cry, Tom Clancy etc and they also are making a lot of licensed games like Avatar or Star Wars. They seem to have a huge management problem with a lot of delays, internal tension among their studios, bad timing and budgeting, and a lot of cancelled games that hurt their profits. The excutives of Ubisoft have said that they are willing sell the company for aqcuisition.

Ubisoft has 40 studios and 19.000 employees. It's a true powerhouse that can boost XBOX and gamepass' content. XBOX has already 40 studios if you combine all the Bethesda/Activision Blizzard workforce along with the xbox studios. Having Ubisoft, the XBOX could be a true giant with over 80 studios and almost 40.000 manpower. XBOX will have enough content to support game pass for the whole year. Also, I believe that Phil Spencer can solve the management problem on Ubisoft, and make them produce better game in the future.

sure why not. ubisoft has been stale for almost a decade now

Absolutely not. It has a terrible work culture and game design philosophy. I don't want them influencing any of Xbox's other games.

yeah, Ubisoft has poor management and working conditions. However, I think Spencer can change the management and improve working conditions to the better.

I don't know, I don't think it's that easy. They have a lot more wrong than just management and working conditions. They have a stale and convoluted philosophy to their world design, as well as comic book level writing, and a gameplay loop centered around some of the greediest monetization in the industry. That kind of work culture is endemic.

You would have to scrap almost everything and start the studio from the beginning. At that point, you might as well build your own studio, it would be cheaper and you would have much more creative control over the direction of it. Unless Xbox buys it for the IP, but at that point they're not really buying Ubisoft the company, they're buying their customers.

There is no way the FCC and the like would allow this after everything that went around with Activision/blizzard. Ubi is just way too big of an aquisition. And of top of that is an open fire nowadays lol

I would have much rathered had saw MS buy Ubisoft and SEGA to Activision myself

There’s no chance.

It’s far too big of a company. It just wouldn’t pass the merger.

Not to mention that Ubisoft has the cloud gaming rights for ABK stuff, so that would be a legal nightmare.

Plus MS don’t actually need it. 40studios is enough to put 8 first party games on GPU a year (assuming a fair 5 year development period). And 19000 is a hell of a lot more people to bring into a company even MS size again.

MS need to manage their studio output better, better QA and so on. They would be fine then.

Had they not bought ABK, I think Ubisoft would have been an 'Alternative' option but I can't see MS buying Ubisoft as it exists 'now' because it would prove a Legal nightmare with numerous legislative bodies likely to block it - especially as Ubisoft and MS came to an agreement over Cloud rights in the UK.

At best, they could buy IP's or individual studios from Ubisoft - much in the same way other companies have recently bought/sold IP's and Studio's as these would not come under the same scrutiny. There is quite a big difference between buying a Privately owned business and a Publicly owned company with Shareholders.

Unless a deal comes up to good to pass up for a Studio and/or its IP's, I would agree that MS need to integrate what they have better into their company. ABK with more staff than the rest of 'Xbox' (inc the Zenimax group) combined only joined 5months ago and seemed in a complete mess. All 'Activision' Studio's tied up in grinding out annual CoD releases and Blizzard not exactly making a lot of games either. All those studio's with very little 'product'.

As a customer, I feel I'm still waiting for the games these acquisitions 'promise'. Still waiting for the games those Studio's bought in 2018 to arrive - State of Decay 3 (undead Labs), Hellblade 2 (Ninja Theory), Perfect Dark (The Initiative) etc so I don't really think MS 'needs' more Studio's, just needs to get all their Studio's organised and integrated into MS and delivering on the Games...

Absolutely not.

Microsoft should forget about acquisitions for the time being and invest in the IP and studios they have now with a strategy of:

1) Expanding poorly-represented genres on Xbox consoles, instead of competing directly with the most popular third-party titles.

2) Expanding their library of games with local multiplayer to better promote the Xbox Series S as a "family" or "party" machine, and abandoning the strategy of promoting the Xbox Series S as a "poor man's console".

3) Reducing the priority of niche, AAA third-party games for day one releases on Game Pass, and instead investing further in third-party indie titles for Game Pass as a means of complimenting well-made first-party AAA titles, in addition to AAA third-party games released a year ago or more.

4) Licensing unused or dormant IP under Microsoft's ownership to third-party studios for release on Xbox platforms, eg: Star Control, Gun, The Lost Vikings, Spyro the Dragon, Banjo Kazooie, etc.

I agree they need to sort out their crap PR and really start to spend some money on proper TV spots and also it be nice if more use was made of the BC team to bring more OG Xbox games over

Or they can actually use the talent they already have but apparently that's too much to ask, just consolidate even more.

I honestly don’t think they should buy Ubisoft or any other game studio for that matter, especially after we saw all the trouble and scrutiny the FTC gave Microsoft when they were finalizing their purchase of Activision-Blizzard over an endless amount of months, but I know they still are going to continue buying studios like they always do and hoping something sticks to the wall. I’m not even trying to be anti-Xbox or an advocate for “console wars” or anything; I just feel that their strategy of buying already established companies is a bad one, since they do little with the companies they owned before the Activision acquisition.

To me, it feels that now their goal is to buy popular, pre-existing IPs and franchises to stay relevant instead of trying to make original works. And what makes this worse is that they DO own the rights to popular IPs but don’t license them out to companies or teams, which results in a bunch of their IPs staying dormant and only really getting merch drops or occasional acknowledgement, though I do think Microsoft said a few years ago that they don’t force any of their studios into making games they don’t want to make, which I do think is a good and allows for them to make creative and new games, but if any of their studios don’t want to make games using the mountain of IP they own, why not give it to a couple third-party or second-party studios that are willing to develop new entries, show an interest in it, or have the skills and experience to show that they can make great games with those IPs? I think a mix of original IPs and older IPs could help appeal to almost every type of gamer, but I’m so doubtful they would bother with that idea.

@Pastellioli

They're entirely against putting in actual effort it seems and just want to buy up the industry, sadly regulators are just allowing it.

I stand by that none of the console manufacturers should be allowed to buy publishers and would feel the same if those ridiculous Sony buys Square Enix rumours actually happened.

@Pastellioli Flight Sim is one of the oldest gaming IP's and made by a '3rd party' as was Forza Horizon (until 2018 when Playground became 1st Party), Age of Empires, Crackdown etc.

In 2017, MS owned Rare (Sea of Thieves), 343 (Halo), the Coalition (Gears), Turn 10 (Forza) and Mojang (Minecraft). That was their entire 1st Party Studio line-up. From 2018, they have built up their 'portfolio' of both Studio's and IP's to be in a position to 'compete' with other 'big' Gaming Producers - and by producers, I don't mean just those with their 'own' platform like Sony or MS. With the purchase of ABK, that really only gives them as many IP's as Sony in their library.

People talk about the 360 gen - but games like Mass Effect, Oblivion, BioShock etc that 'helped' the console all ended up on PS too. Call of Duty became the juggernaut it is thanks to MS and Xbox 360. Gears wasn't a MS 'owned' IP - it was owned by Epic until they decided to sell it to MS.

In 2018, MS added more studios - inc Ninja Theory (Hellblade, Enslaved), undead Labs (State of Decay), Compulsion (We Happy Few, South of Midnight), Playground (Forza Horizon, Fable), the initiative (newly created Studio - Perfect Dark), inXile (Wasteland, Clockwork Revolution), Obsidian (Grounded, Avowed) and Double Fine (Brutal Legend, Psychonauts). In March 2021, MS added Zenimax (Bethesda, Tango, id Software, MachineGames, Arkane etc) and then added ABK in October 2023 (where most Activision Studios are only working on CoD). Zemimax has been part of MS for just 3yrs (with their first 2 releases PS5 'timed' exclusives - Deathloop & Ghostwire) and ABK much less than a year.

Just based on what we 'know' about in terms of games in development - MS has 'new' IP's coming - the likes of Clockwork Revolution, Avowed etc as well as the 'return' of some old IP's - the likes of Fable, Perfect Dark etc and even a 'licensed' Indiana Jones game is coming

So to me, I see a mix of Original IP's and the return of a 'older' IPs from these - and I'm sure they'd license an IP to the right '3rd party' Studio if they had a 'great' idea to build a game using that IP. I'm sure that if MS thought an idea would suit a 'dormant' IP or a studio is struggling, these old IP's may inspire or 'focus' the team.

Anyway, with games taking a lot longer these days to make and get out, as well as many of these Studios/IP's only being owned for months to a few years at most, its perhaps too 'early' to expect a plethora of their 'old' as well as 'new' IPs. That being said, the likes of Fable, Perfect Dark, Clockwork Revolution, Avowed, Indiana Jones, Hellblade 2, Flight Sim 24 etc are coming - a mix of old/new IP's

@BAMozzy You are right. I think I am maybe expecting a little too much when it comes to them having a mix of “old” and “new” IPs and I didn’t really see initially that their upcoming game lineup does include some new IP and a couple old IP. I probably should be patient with the new projects they have in development (both announced and behind closed doors) since we all know that game development has become harder than ever and game developers always get so much flack from people. There was a news story last year talking about the development of the upcoming Perfect Dark that was revealed a couple years ago, and the article said that the game was going through multiple troubles (e.g. developers leaving and creative differences) that have been slowing the game’s development cycle, and it’s very unfortunate to hear what the developers are going through. If I can remember, Microsoft said a few years ago that they were planning on using more of Rare’s old IP and there were talks of reviving dormant Activision IPs before the purchase was finalized, so this could be just the beginning. Hopefully things do pan out well for all the development teams and studios at Microsoft.

Also, I never even knew Flight Sim and Forza Horizon were initially by third-party studios! Thank you for telling me that.

@Pastellioli Forza Horizon was a 'licensed' game made by Playground who only joined MS in 2018 - just before Forza Horizon 4 released - their 'first' as a First Party. Asobo currently make Flight Sim - a Studio not owned by MS. State of Decay, a MS IP, has never been made by a first party Studio - the 2nd released before they joined MS and we await the 3rd - their 'first' game as a 1st Party developer.

MS bought the 'Gears' IP from Epic and set-up the Coalition to take over - similar to setting up 343 to take over Halo from Bungie when they left. They basically created two studios to work on their IP's after the OG devs (1 3rd Party) decided they didn't want to carry on with those IP's. Bungie gave up Halo to 'buy' their freedom from MS and MS bought Gears to keep the IP alive.

If you look at SuckerPunch from Sony's Studios, they only released 2 games during the PS4 era - Infamous: 2nd Son in 2014 and Ghost of Tsushima over 6yrs later. There was over 5yrs between Horizon: ZD and Horizon:FW and 5yrs between God of War and its sequel Ragnarok and these were sequels with a lot of Assets etc they can reuse to save time. There is 'more' time between these releases than MS has been 'allowed' to make games of 'similar' quality.

Lets also not forget that 'most' studios had just released, or were working on games they 'promised' to be multi-platform.
Compulsion (joined 2018) had just released We Happy Few, now working on South of Midnight
UnDead Labs (2018) just released State of Decay 2, now working on State of Decay 3
Ninja Theory (2018) Released Hellblade and has since released Bleeding Edge and HB2 is releasing 'soon'
The Initiative (2018) Brand new studio created from scratch - Making Perfect Dark (with Crystal Dynamics)
Playground Games (2018) Released Forza Horizon 4/5 and working on Fable
Obsidian (2018) had to finish Outer Worlds but has released Grounded & Pentiment with Avowed on its way
InXile (2018) had to finish Wastelands 3 now working on Clockwork Revolution

Zenimax Group joined in March 2021 and we have had games from most Studios Deathloop, Redfall (Both Arkane Studios), Ghostwire and Hifi Rush (Tango), New DLC (fallout76/ESO) & Starfield (Bethesda) with Indiana Jones (MachineGames) and whatever id (who was still making Doom Eternal DLC) is making 'next' really so still 'early' to expect too much in the 'near' future

ABK joined in October and with some Obligations to honour and ABK has basically 'pushed' every Studio into 'Call of Duty' and Blizzard has swallowed up 'numerous' Studios to be 'just' Blizzard - but only have Diablo 4 and Overwatch 2 (on consoles) to show for that - to me, that shows a corporation fixated on the Money, not the creativity or talent - its churn this out 'yearly' to get the 'yearly'' sales and 'yearly cycle of MTX - not particularly Consumer friendly either. Activision were on the brink (Vanguard I think) when CoD was struggling until they 'rebooted' CoD because they basically decided it was more important to release CoD annually financially than let other Studio's make more 'games' to make money if one drops in popularity. The loss in revenue for the months before Christmas any 'delay' would be more financially harmful than 'Profits' from any other games they may release....

Therefore I think changes will come - but after only a 'few' months, there is probably quite a while before we as 'consumers' see any changes 'New' management will bring, how that impacts us (as in the 'Games') will likely be 'years' away as they'd still be on that 'CoD' cycle management (therefore be some-way towards future games as per Koticks demand), and whether or not they 'decide' to split Studios back out once a certain game releases to make their 'own' games to ADD to the Library. It's too early to expect Sledgehammer, Infinity Ward, Treyach, Ravensoft etc to all start making their 'own' different games Maybe one to make CoD - IW for example and let Treyarch make their own game, tell their own stories (not war/CoD related), Maybe Sledgehammer could also make their own game or if not look at the 'portfolio' of IP's for inspiration.

Point is - its far too early for the 'bulk' of Studio's to even start their 'own' games (inc any from the growing collection of IP's) for us, the customer because they had 'obligations' to fulfil and Games take 'years' to build - especially from scratch. We've also had new tech as well as 'new' engines to build for and in some cases wait for (UE5 is 'new' HB2 is one of the first to really use it - but it didn't release until last year - not much time to 'convert and check' maybe wait for 'upgrade '5.1,5.2, 5.3.. 5.5 to see if that helps and/or breaks something to achieve what they want to do and improve performance without sacrificing visual quality..

Look at where they are 'now', the Studios aren't idle and then appreciate that it will take time before these will actually all be producing games from the Portfolio - old and new, New IP's too

@BAMozzy I see! Thanks for enlightening me. Your comments are helping me understand the situation more. It, of course, does take progress and time for change. Hopefully, now that Microsoft owns Activision, the subsidiaries the latter forced to develop CoD are eventually able to develop games that they want to make once positive changes in management come and when their “obligations” are fulfilled. I keep on forgetting that a lot of Microsoft’s game studios aren’t idle and are working on projects already; we just haven’t seen them yet or they are still deep in development, with the teams attached taking time working, which is good and is better than rushing development and releasing something half-baked in the end. Some like to complain or say that some of Microsoft’s studios, like Rare, are “idle” or aren’t really doing anything (likely because of how they appear to only release games every few years). However, in relation to Rare, they are still working on updates for Sea of Thieves and making Everwild. I do know now that a lot of their teams are making new works, and I am excited to see their projects over the years as they are revealed! It’s just a matter of waiting patiently.

Also, I do agree that Activision’s current choices are from being money-hungry rather than actually innovating or being creative. Overwatch 2 was still fun gameplay-wise, but I sort of felt like it was just a rehash and didn’t do much to improve upon the original game, and I am sure that the leading director leaving was a factor in the poor decisions made. Not to mention the introduction of that awful battle pass and locking instant access to newer characters behind a paywall for non-paying gamers (unless you wanted to grind REALLY hard for it), but I have heard they are now going to make the characters free for all, which, in my opinion, took way long and the paywall shouldn’t have been there in the first place. Despite that, I’ve dropped the game since then and have no intentions to return.

no, we didn't get much from the abk deal on game pass.

Since MS has acquired ABK, Activision have opened two new Studios - Elsewhere Studios in Poland - exclusively focused on creating a new narrative-based and genre-defining AAA franchise.

Built from the ground up, Elsewhere Entertainment is a premier and standalone studio dedicated to establishing an environment that inspires bold and diverse ideas. The team’s underlying mission encourages everyone to explore and collaborate creatively to craft a franchise with an enduring legacy that resonates far beyond games.

The talented team at Elsewhere Entertainment consists of a collection of storytelling experts whose credits include The Last of Us, Uncharted, The Witcher, Cyberpunk, Destiny, Tom Clancy’s The Division, and Far Cry.

And Infinity Ward Austin - The studio will work on creating new and innovative experiences for Call of Duty and create state-of-the-art technology to power them. Our studio provides a safe, trusting, and empowering environment to unleash your creativity and help make the extraordinary.

As MS own Activision now, they also own those two new Studios so I think MS have their hands full with what they have at the moment. We have seen some structural changes too as the management of Zenimax and now ABK (Kotick and Co) have left but it still takes time to filter down to Studios. You don't want to go in and make radical decisions that impact the projects they were working on - which may have been 'problematic' with Redfall - other than telling the Studio not to worry about porting to Playstation or making it a 'live service' game as was Zenimax's desire, they left the Studio 'alone' to finish that game and no doubt haven't impacted CoD - other than ensuring it has parity on all systems and on GP day 1, Treyarch was working on it, no doubt had planned to release (as Kotick would want) this year so probably had little/no MS impact. What happens after BO6 with IW who just finished MW2 as MS took over, with Sledgehammer who released MW3 under MS, who knows...

It may not be 'annual' after BO6 or whatever IW release, may not follow the same pattern. They could make BO6 last 'longer' rather than pressure IW to release 'something' in that annual slot, release Sledgehammer to make something else instead of churning out CoD, or 'restructure' so CoD Online is given to Raven and MP is integrated into Warzone F2P with Seasons and maybe Annual era changes. Any Single Player Campaigns being Sold separately (a bit like Halo:Infinite) if their Studios want to make a Single Player FPS war story that having the CoD name will sell.

Until MS have full control, not 'honouring' any previous deals and of course that includes games 'greenlit' by their former bosses they are 'commiting' to continuing the development through to release. We have seen games like Starfield, Hifi Rush, Redfall and soon Indiana Jones too - likely all 'greenlit' by Zenimax before MS took over. Same with Black Ops 6 and maybe whatever IW had been greenlit to make after. If the deal hadn't gone through, the management would want those studios developing the games they 'expect' them to make if they had to remain in charge. That's why I don't expect sweeping changes.

ABK is quite difficult with quite a few 'licensed' games they perhaps can't bring to BC and the rest need to be checked and ensure they work with BC before dropping. Also they perhaps have deals in place meaning they have to wait for games to leave or deals to expire (inc Sony's CoD deals for the last 10yrs of CoD games) before bringing 'old' games to BC . It's not as if no game has come to Game Pass as we have Diablo 4 and BO6 is coming Day 1 too.

I don't think MS should (or Could) buy Ubisoft. I think it would be ABK or Ubisoft, not both and ABK was ready to be bought. If it wasn't MS, it could have been Ten Cent (Chinese owning more US companies) or Embracer, could have been Amazon or Apple too. But I doubt MS could buy Ubisoft now.

Given the choice of Ubisoft or ABK, I still think ABK has the biggest scope for MS, but Ubisoft maybe had the wider variety of games - certainly in recent years on Console. However, Blizzard is more PC focused and King the biggest Mobile Publisher so arguably the better Purchase for MS. For King, they now have a LOT more IP's to bring to Mobile - inc Halo, Gears, Doom, Forza, Fable, Conker, Blinx etc etc and for MS, maybe bring WoW to Consoles.

I really don't think MS will buy another 'big' Publisher unless they are 'not' Publicly owned, therefore would require FTC investigation. They can buy 'independent' studios as these are Privately owned so no 'Public' investigation. In other words, I wouldn't be surprised to see MS acquire more 'Studios' they can add to their 'Xbox Studios', maybe buy/acquire/open new Studio's under Zenimax or Activision too (as we have seen with IW Austin and Elsewhere Entertainment for example) but I really don't see them buying Ubisoft or another 'big' publisher with numerous studios.

I can certainly understand why MS in particular wants to buy a Publisher, not just Studios to make games. They also want the Publishing rights to their Library of games they already have made for BC, for Game Pass etc. If they bought Ubisoft, it's not just for their 'upcoming' games, its also for all their OLD games too. But buying a studio doesn't mean they get their IP's or Publishing rights to their old games. They didn't own Fallout New Vegas or its Publishing rights to put on Game Pass despite owning Obsidian - until they bought Zenimax who published FNV and own the Fallout IP. Buying Infinity Ward from Activision wouldn't give then Call of Duty or the old Infinity Ward CoDs they made, but buying Activision does. Buying Crystal Dynamics today won't get you the Tomb Raider Trilogy to put on Game Pass so you can only make 'money' once that Studio has product to sell. That's why buying Insomniac with 'few' IP's of their own and basically no publishing rights was 10x cheaper than buying Bungie with only their Destiny IP but Publishing rights (so all money spent in Destiny goes to the Publisher which is now owned by Sony so instantly starts making money back). As soon as MS owned ABK, every Diablo 4, CoD, WoW or mobile King game purchase goes to MS now as 'owner' of the Publishing rights. If you buy 'Crash 4' today on Playstation, even though it was 'published' by Activision, that is money for MS. Point is, own Publishing rights, can start recouping the money spent on acquiring them straight away, buy a 'Studio', you may get IP's, but have to wait for 'product' to sell - unless you've commissioned and published their games in the past of course.

The TL:DR - Big Publishers are likely off the table now - so Ubisoft is incredibly unlikely to be bought by MS. That doesn't mean that MS can't or won't buy Studios if they think they will 'add' to their Studios and will be 'better' for them than maybe commissioning that Studio to create games they 'Publish'. MS could buy Asobo (who make Flight Sim and Plague Tale games for example) but maybe won't because they don't 'need' to buy. Same with Certain Affinity who has worked with 343 on Halo for example but if those Studios were to 'sell' up, MS may well change their mind and 'buy'...