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Xbox's acquisition of Activision Blizzard looks to almost be complete in the UK, as the Competition and Markets Authority has today narrowed its "scope of concerns" relating to the deal, specifically in regards to the "lessening of competition".
Basically, the CMA no longer thinks that the deal poses any threat to the console market, meaning Sony's concerns about Call of Duty are now falling on deaf ears. Here's a bit of what the CMA had to say in its latest press release:
"Having considered the additional evidence provided, we have now provisionally concluded that the merger will not result in a substantial lessening of competition in console gaming services because the cost to Microsoft of withholding Call of Duty from PlayStation would outweigh any gains from taking such action."
Although this might sound like the CMA is fully in favour of the acquisition, it's pointed out further down the press release that today's provisional findings have no relation to the CMA's ongoing concerns about the cloud gaming market, so there's still plenty to be settled before the regulator reaches its final verdict by late April.
"Our provisional view that this deal raises concerns in the cloud gaming market is not affected by today’s announcement. Our investigation remains on course for completion by the end of April."
It's not over just yet, then, but today undoubtedly marks a big step forward for Microsoft's attempt to gain approval for the Activision Blizzard acquisition in the UK. We're hopefully almost there, folks!
What are your thoughts on this? Let us know down in the comments section below.
[source gov.uk]
Comments 113
I don't get the cloud concerns. Google tried and failed on its own. It's not like the failure had anything to do with Microsoft. Doesn't Amazon have a cloud service as well, Luna? Sony has PlayStation Now-Plus.
Anyway, it's great to see that Sony's hypocritical complaints are being ignored.
@Banjo- Think the cloud concerns will now be met by behavioural remedies anyway due to the 10 year agreements with Nvidia and other cloud gaming providers
Even the cloud gaming aspect, which they’ve said more are coming, I suspect will be satisfied.
@Widey85 Yeah, I think you're right there.
@FraserG @Widey85 I assume that the 10-year agreements include cloud services. There was a smaller streaming service that recently accepted the offer, I don't remember the name.
112% going through.
Without.
A.
Damn.
Doubt.
How is it feel Jim, so much waste time in space.
@Deadeye13 I heard he's travelling to Mars next.
Sony overplayed their hand and are going to come away from this worse.
@Fenbops Yep, it backfired. Firstly, Microsoft acquired Zenimax just after Sony started paying for Bethesda's games temporary exclusiveness. Secondly, Microsoft is getting ABK after Sony paid for exclusive Call of Duty access and content and finally the judge granted Microsoft most of Sony's confidential documents.
Almost there folks. Unfortunately EI delayed till May so we have 2 more months of this....but almost there.
Just take the 10 years Sony. Been saying this for ages
@Banjo- Yes the smaller cloud providers but the big one is Nvidia as Geforce Now is the biggest rival to Xbox Cloud Gaming despite working in a different way (you need to own the games on Steam etc, not included in subscription)
They were against but once they signed a 10 year deal with Xbox are now on board
@Widey85 Thanks. Basically, everyone is on board but Sony.
Well if its going through, it would be better to be sooner rather than later!
Those suggesting Sony should not have fought it are deluded, they have 10 years cod instead of 3. I always thought MS were giving away too much with the 10 years myself, as its hard to argue 10 years is a necessary balance? But that appears to be whats helped it get across the line, so I guess its done the job 😊
People forget that if Microsoft wanted to outright buy exclusive right for any games they can even buy exclusivity even from Sony. But they remained on track to strengthen their relationship with countless smaller studios and publishers. Which seems to be paying dividend now. And then they targeted big studios and publishers to further bolster their first party lineup. A brilliant strategy and one I can see having far reaching positive effect in the gaming industry. Game pass has been the perfect blessing for gamers and going down the line game pass thrives so much that people from all aspects of life can enjoy it.
Watch how Sony will run and take the 10 years now
Time for Sony to take the deal
Like I've said before ... whisper never a doubt ...
Previously on the ABK acquisition drama....Jim Rayn:
-I'm not interested in remedies or 10 years COD deals, I just want to block the merger. A few weeks later, Jim Ryan- quickly dig out the email with the 10-year COD contract dammit!!😅
Oh, so we don't get to hear Jim Ryan cry? What a shame!
Also, these are extremely dark times for PS fanboys. Please give them space.
@Titntin absolutely no problem with them fighting it. I have said all along though that Sony needed to be careful with how hard they push back and to me it seems they’ve stepped over the line and overestimated their influence with regulators. They’ll still come away with COD on their platform but they’ve given Microsoft a treasure trove of documents showing how they’ve operated over the last 5 years. You have to wonder if they could have avoided that if they’d have been more cooperative throughout the process. Jim saying ‘we don’t want your deal we just want to stop your merger’ could have been a mistake.
@Kaloudz
Dear Phil,
Sorry for pestering you all this time and ignoring your proposals. I didn't mean to lie to the regulators and backstab you. I just wanted a friend and they looked nice and tricked me.
I didn't mean for Final Fantasy games to exclude your gaming platform when I signed the cheques. I thought that it was for getting an alternative skin for Cloud.
Can you please share all your games with me?
Yours sincerely,
Jim
@Kaloudz you should see the comment section on PushSquare. "I hope you're all happy!" Acting like the sky is falling, gaming is over, and worried about monopolies and "higher game pass prices."
Hilarious. Clearly they haven't been noticing the price gouging done by competitors, nor do they know what a monopoly even is when they make comments like that. The gaming industry is so vast that thinking this is a monopoly for someone in third place is laughable at best. I can't wait to see where gaming goes now. It's exciting. Some people just want their plastic box to have all the preferential treatment. Not anymore.
I just want another StarCraft, probably my favorite ABK IP.
@Kaloudz I tried to write it like the victim that Sony is playing 😂.
@Kaloudz touting console sales/UK physical sales charts won't hide the bitterness on this news I guess.
Not that anything is being taken away from them anyway.
@J_Mo_Money Didn't they mention Sony's attempts at removing third-party games from Xbox and Game Pass and how they paid for Ghostwire Tokyo and Deadloop, with Starfield next in the queue, to skip Xbox for one year, not to mention things like Final Fantasy VII Remake/Intergrade/Rebirth, the PS5 upgrade fees and remasters remastered being sold as new games? Honestly, I wonder what Sony would be doing right now if nobody stopped them somehow.
@Banjo- yeah someone mentioned it in another article but they locked down Ghostwire and Deathloop, and tried to get Starfield and i bet MS was like "ok, enough is enough" and just bought it outright. They also kept getting exclusive content for ABK and probably tried to lock down more stuff and MS was just getting tired of it.
I've been told time and again exclusives sell consoles, if you want to play that game get the console, ect" Well, it's time to take that same advice on a platform that can be accessed through console, pc, cloud on any device. No reason not to jump in.
If you truly go where the games are, well, there they are then.
@Kaloudz I agree.
@J_Mo_Money Totally right. Microsoft started fishing small fry to nurture Game Pass: Dead Labs, Compulsion Games, Double Fine plus obvious choices such as Playground (Forza Horizon). Once Sony started their anti-competitive conduct through exclusion deals and payments to big game publishers (PS version yes, PC version yes, Xbox version no), they triggered the big acquisitions that, ironically, can't afford.
@Banjo- Can't say i feel sorry for them. It's not show-friends, it's show-business. At the end of the day, it's big bank eats little bank and big bank is finally showing up to the party.
Competition is good Banjo! lol
@J_Mo_Money Who can feel sorry for hypocritical and selfish executives and fans? 😉 This is a humility lesson that you win when you lose and Sony is not going anywhere as a video game publisher and gaming platform owner. If anything, it will balance things a bit.
@J_Mo_Money it’s days like this where I miss going over to PS to enjoy the golden rivers that community provides.
@Kaloudz I honestly don’t think Sony care how they look coming out of this, the same way they don’t care about raising prices and selling remakes for £70. They know they have a player base that’ll buy in regardless. They’ll care about Microsoft seeing their documents though 🤣 oops.
@Fenbops We agree completely although you are more polite 🤣.
@UnusedBabyWipes so you’ll be buying shares in Activision? They’re currently about $79. If the acquisition goes thro Microsoft will pa $92 per share!!
I really don’t understand why people are so angry with Playstation paying for timed exclusivity??? This isn’t a new thing. The first console to do this was Atari 2600. They had by far the biggest user base an paid for arcade games to be exclusive to Atari. Nintendo then paid for game devs to not make any games for other systems at all. Their cartridges had a chip that prevented them being copied. Wen game devs started releasing unlicensed games for other systems Nintendo sued the devs and the companies who took the games. This was eventually deemed illegal! Playstation 1 paid for exclusivity to GTA 3, then Xbox came on the scene an did the same for various games. To slate Playstation for doing this is bizarre!!! They have all done it!!
The cloud gaming stuff is interesting. It is an emerging market. I currently use it as a secondary way to play games (When I don't have access to my console or gaming PC). But, I can see it becoming more and more a primary way to play games for many people that don't want to buy (or can't afford to buy) a console or PC.
Theoretically, if MS withholds Activision-Blizzard games from competitors in this market and makes them available only on xCloud they could gain dominance there given their massive head start with Azure infrastructure.
I can totally see why regulators are concerned about that. In 5-10 years this may be a primary place for many gamers to play if the tech keeps improving.
@jordan1992 Nah, I know nothing about shares and stocks and such. Also my dad regularly checks my banking and I don't think he'd approve.
@jordan1992
Personally, exclusivity is exclusionary and anti-competitive no matter who does it and for what game.
It is like saying, you can only play certain blu-rays on certain vendor's blu-ray players. We would think of that is ridiculous. But, for some reason in gaming this is an accepted practice. Simply because the hardware vendors refuse to standardize the network, programming environment, and hardware to play games upon.
Good. Maybe next time, SOny would mind their own damn business like they should have from jump.
Now MS will get Activision AND look at Sony’s dealings and learn how to counter them. Whomp whomp.
Can’t wait for the Pony meltdown from this.
With this, MS will get more leverage and Sony will lose some among 3rd party publishers. Choice matters, and I’d like the choice to play games like Stellar Blade and FF on Xbox even though I have all consoles, but that’s been taken away from me.
This basically means this deal is going through. I am certain CMA will be happy with the cloud gaming deals MS has offered.
But, oh my... is this is going to go so well with certain community members.
@jordan1992 Atari didn't exactly pay for third party exclusives. They paid for the license to make their own version of these third party arcade exclusives. All these games were made by Atari themselves, as far as Atari cared back then, they were the only ones that made Atari games. Third party games were not exactly licensed, but Atari had no way to stop them, unlike Nintendo later, as you explained. Edit: Often these were not even exclusive, often enough they simply were the only ones licensing the games, but other times Coleco and even NES (there was an overlap with the 2600) would also get versions.
On that Nintendo note: Nintendo didn't "pay" for third party exclusives either. They simply used their market position to tell publishers "if you want your game on our console, you must sign this contract that blocks you from making games for the competition (Sega)." I am having a hard time finding the exact legal challenges they faced, most search results are prioritizing Atari vs Nintendo and hearings between Sega and Nintendo over violence in video games, but there was a change, not sure if court mandated or law, that made the contracts invalid, opening up for publishers to make games for competing consoles.
I think it was basically the Genesis era that we first saw paid-for third party exclusives, first one I can think of are the Mega Man Willy Wars, that didn't make it to the US at the time since it was locked behind Sega's Japan exclusive subscription service (Game Pass before Game Pass!!!).
Edit:
Correction, Willy Wars was actually 1994, so the first paid for third party exclusive i can think of ends up being Street Fighter II on the SNES, 1992.
It's over, isn't it?
Take the L, Sony. Ryan and their ilk are beyond pathetic and whiney at this point.
Common sense seems to be prevailing. This is a rare occurrence with governing bodies.
@IronMan30 What are the dark days? I have confusion.
Big question I have.
Why was none this kind of craziness brought up when Sony purchased Insomniac Games? Xbox players not being able play spider-man is an issue.
But some how, some way, that's ok?
@NeoRatt i don’t agree with it either, 3rd party games should come to all devices day 1. I’m all for exclusives made by Playstation, Xbox, Nintendo but timed exclusives should be stopped. I own all 3 consoles but not everyone does. I’m just saying it’s been about since Atari 2600 days. Xbox did it too wen the 360 had a close user base to PS3. Think PS3 sold about 3 mill more consoles than 360, it was very close.
Another nail in the Sony coffin.
@GuyinPA75 The only issue with CoD is largely one generated by Sony, that claims it's "too big" to be allowed to be platform exclusive, largely because an outsize part of their revenue and strategy depended on it. That's not a good strategy, but it was their strategy. And it clicked nicely with a moment in time when there's some political/public backlash against big mergers, which, is actually good, and it's about time, and the endless mergers into triopolies DOES need to stop. But this particular case was a bad one, because it's a market where one company already dominates the market to an extreme, and this merger is an attempt to interrupt that holding pattern.
Spiderman didn't matter, because it wasn't an existing title that represented an outsize portion of Xbox's revenue, it represented $0 for MS, and for the same reason Skyrim doesn't matter in regulator's eyes for Sony because it doesn't represent a significant portion of their revenue as CoD does.
@jordan1992 I was really hoping an outcome of all this would have been dragging into the open and ending all the paid third party exclusivity nonsense, but, alas....
@jordan1992
I just don't think anything should be exclusive in any way. I buy three consoles per generation, I would prefer to just buy one and be able to play every game release.
Also don't like separate trophies/achievement systems. Why can't I just choose one network platform and use it for everything.
Same with game subscription services. I want to choose one that gives me everything I want. Gaming is getting as bad as movie/tv streaming services. You end up buying them all and wasting money on a bunch of content you don't want.
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Hopefully they come to a decision on the cloud aspect of all this and can finally come to an ultimate conclusion. This has been going on so long. So much bickering and fighting between the companies and their gamers. Whatever the decision, it would be nice to not have this coming up every week.
@Sanquine Not at all. This might shock your little brain (you mentioned my head) but people reading an article about the acquisition will make comments about it. Did you come to an Xbox site and read all the comments just to say that? Your profile tells me you don't like Xbox so I'm confused. Wouldn't it be wiser to play something on your PS5?
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@Banjo- @sanquine Banjo, you do come across as very anti Playstation. It’s fine to have a preference, i think i told ya before i own both PS5 an Series X, both are incredible but i do prefer the PS5 simply because their exclusives are my fav type of games. If Xbox started releasing huge, story driven games my preference may alter. I’d like to be able to say i can’t choose, both make incredible, story driven games. I live in hope Starfield lives up to the hype. Hating on Playstation comes across as very fanboyish tho, you talk about Playstation like a Manchester United fan talks about Liverpool. Hence the term fanboy.
I hope Activision's studios don't become more creatively bankrupt like Xbox's current (non-Bethesda or Obisidian) studios. Like for goodness sake come up with a new IP for us to play already instead flailing to keep old franchises going.
In the end, I don't think any publisher gaining more and more studios is great, but in the end I guess instead of borrowing the yearly CoD title from my local library, playing the campaign and returning it, I can play it on Gamepass and then delete it. Though could someone teach those CoD studios to make a game that doesn't take up a ridiculous amount of storage space, the Series S barely has any as it is!
@Kaloudz Of course Activision is happy, MS (for some reason) is paying above market price per share to acquire Activision. Kotick and the rest of those aholes running that company are about to make out like bandits.
@jordan1992 Forgive me for expressing my honest opinions, perhaps I should be a hypocrite like you. Supporting him and criticising me only describes yourself.
@NEStalgia I'm starting to think we aren't getting our dirty laundry. That's kind of a shame. However, with what might be the greatest battle of this long-winded console war coming to a conclusion, what a ride this one has been. I feel like we've all learned a lot, seen a lot of really highly paid people make fools of themselves, shined some lights in dark places the regulators need to be looking at, and breaking Sony's iron grip on the gaming industry. All that said, I'm pretty content even without the trials and dirty laundry.
@Banjo- Kinda thought the same thing.
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@Banjo- he basically called you a fanboy. I’m not callin you anything but i can see why he said that. I’m not anti Xbox just because i prefer Playstation. Like i said, i wish i couldn’t choose as they both make my fav games. I love Xbox, i LOVE Playstation. You come across as tho you love Xbox an HATE Playstation.
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@jordan1992 And what's your problem with my opinions? Just ignore me instead of supporting a troll. Don't justify yourself supporting bait and flame and then pretend that you are unbiased and innocent. It's ridiculous.
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@Banjo- it’s just the hate dude. It’s bonkers. Like i said, it’s like Man United an Liverpool fans. They hate each other too. But that’s football, there’s huge rivalry.
Keep going you two...
@SplooshDmg I paid for dirty laundry. I want my dirty laundry darnit!
If it sends Jim to the doghouse, it was all worth it, though.
@Banjo- yeah it's extremely easy to point out the fake-neutrals around here, especially the ones that pretend to be above it all but they forget you can see the comment history on their profile. Not fooling anyone.
@jordan1992 The weird thing about it too, in sports when one team wins, the other loses. Business competition isn't such a zero sum game. Like with Marvel and DC when one of those companies is doing good work it raises interest in all comic book properties. I guess with console wars, many people (especially kids) can't afford to get all the systems, so it pushes people into corners to pick a side. I just wish people could be fans instead of fanboys. I prefer Playstation, but I own a Switch and a Series S too. However, when I criticize Xbox because I want them to do better the fanboys want to shove me into one of those corners.
@Titntin do they have 10 years of COD though? They kept rejecting the deal and at the moment have nothing apart from existing deals.
@Banjo- you’re very touchy. I’ve not given you any grief wat so ever. There’s really no need to be so defensive!! It just puzzles me why you hate Playstation. You’re a gamer, Playstation an Xbox are the best systems on the market, Switch is cool too but PS an Xbox are top of the pile. You’d have much more fun if you just played both. Like i said, prefering Xbox is fine, opinions and all, but the hate is really not necessary.
@J_Mo_Money Yep, there are many fake-neutrals here. I couldn't care less about their real preferences, I don't go to PS to harass them even though I have a PS4 and used to visit the site but they come here with all their fanaticism, intolerance, compulsion, hypocrisy and hatred and yet they dare to tell me what my opinions should be about the topic. It's madness. I'm only sorry for the readers that have to deal with their ridiculous scenes.
@NEStalgia Yeah, I mean, this clearly isn't what we ordered. It's like going through the drive thru and ordering chicken, but they gave you fish instead. Probably didn't even drop any tartar sauce in the bag. Color me disappointed.
Looks like we may actually see another Crash, Spyro, and/or Tony Hawk game!!! Yes!!! It’s going to go through! Activision non Cod titles will be saved!
@Serpentes420 yeah, i agree. Like i said i have no problem people preferring one over the other. I just don’t get why some seem to think you have to choose sides. Like you’d never catch a football fan wearing a rival teams shirt, even if it’s a gorgeous looking shirt! I get that! I’m a football fan, Sheff Wednesday, i wouldn’t be seen dead in a Sheff United shirt!! With video games tho it’s bizarre!!
I seriously couldn’t care about call of duty. If it would disappear tomorrow, I wouldn’t miss it. The main thing I’m excited about all this is, the access that Microsoft will have to so many cool IPs that Activision has ignored in favour of COD and would continue to ignore. Microsoft will be able to revive them and farm them out to other developers. I’m hoping for great things!
@RobNZ64 Starcraft. give it to me.
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@SplooshDmg I gave the thumbs down in the arena and all. I expected bloodshed. Then CMA had to go all "reasonable" and "become aware of facts" and spoil the mood of the event.
@Sebatrox You really hurt my feelings.. GOW is a great game and I bet if it was on Xbox you would have loved it 😎
@jordan1992 I'd just ignore him, he's the same on almost all articles, always taking sly digs at Sony who are obviously living rent free in his head, also most of his comments are hypocritical. Yet you're the fantatic and not them.
@UltimateOtaku91 Says the first Sony fan to come to this site to turn anything against Microsoft... You, that falsely pretend to be neutral lately, are calling me hypocrite while supporting a Sony troll on an Xbox site?
@Sanquine God of war 2018 wouldn't of sold 23 million copies if it wasn't good, wouldn't of won game of the year if it wasn't good and its sequel Ragnarok wouldn't of sold 11 million copies in just under 4 months if it wasn't good, a feat no Microsoft made game has achieved. But there will always be haters.
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jordan1992 wrote:
You're just describing yourself. Thanks for finally showing everybody what you are.
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@Sam_TSM
A theory I saw a bit ago from an actual investment analyst is a legal tactic of creating the equivalent to an LLC in the UK, transfer all UK-side operations into that independent entity, proceed with the merger, and do no operational changes in the region (no exclusivities, no game pass, etc) while they go through the courts to try getting them to overturn the CMA's decision.
Excellent news! It's as good as done! And the sweet sweet icing on the cake is Sony has got nothing, it overplayed its hand way too much, made up totally obvious bull crap, claiming MS would deliberately cripple their games on PS and the adults saw that as a child throwing a tantrum and treated Sony as such, HAH! Go and cry in the corner Ryan.
Sonys only option now is to sign the deal or get nothing.
@Tharsman That won't work, the courts cannot overturn the CMA's decision. All they can do is order it is reviewed again by the CMA and it'll be the same team who said no in the first place. That's the CMA appeal process, as such very very few appeals get a change in verdict.
@jordan1992 I’m not sure if you’re seeing this right. People don’t “hate PlayStation”. They hate (or get extremely annoyed by) the PEOPLE who spout off on these console war related things. I enjoy playing Spider-Man on PC and truly love Uncharted. Ratchet and Clank is one of the best series of all time. Don’t care much for Bloodbourne, God of War, or Last of Us but that’s a preference thing. I may not like some of the practices of Sony lately, but I like their movie division and respect their games.
As a primarily xbox guy though, I get annoyed by the reactions and the crying to announcements like these. It was all the people crying “this isn’t fair!” and “we need to stop this!” And “you are evil if you support this!”, trashing people for saying positive things about the merger (great for gamepass, helps the culture of A-B, potentially brings back dormant IPs under a new model, etc.). I’ll fully admit I’m caught up in this whole thing and totally on one side. It is what it is. But I have nothing against Sony as a company. I have it against the online whiners, and am looking forward to saying “stop crying and deal with it” when the merger completes. People don’t hate companies. We get annoyed by other people.
And before you say the classic “but that happens on both sides!” Yep! it does. But in this story it’s pretty straightforward. The purchase was announced and Xbox gamers everywhere said “awesome! COD on gamepass, restored IPs, and more! Yay”. And PlayStation gamers then took up some sort of vengeful crusade to trash and demean anybody excited about this out of, idk, frustration? Anger? Either way, I was just excited for something, and then got dumped on. So yeah, forgive me if it feels a little good to see those people eat their words a little, especially as all of the hypocritical business practices of Sony have come out.
@UltimateOtaku91
I can understand that people find PlayStation games boring as they are much slower in pace (compare Halo with GOW),. Overall PlayStation games are more movie like than games from Xbox or Nintendo but that’s what I like.
@NeoRatt sounds like you just want a PC.
@jordan1992 Actually the Nintendo Switch is numero uno. By a lot.
@Banjo- How they are behaving on here is so embarrassing. Go cry quietly into your soup or act like an adult.
Thank god this all might be finally be over even if I'm not a fan of huge take overs. What this whole sorry saga has shown me though is...
1) how petty and slimy big corps can be.
2) How after all this time that console wars are still a big thing which actually makes gamers look really bad!
It's honestly been embarrassing to read what has been said by some on this site and sister sites by certain individuals and when gaming can be such a beautiful thing that can bring people together, it can also be a thing that causes anger and resentment.
Such a shame to see. I also include myself in my disappointment of being swept up in the madness.
@bobbypaycheque @bobbypaycheque I recall an interview Phil Spencer made last year I think, and he said what happens is most people go into a store, and walk out with a Nintendo Switch. He was honest about it.
Good grief I just read the report on this on Push Square, the article and endless comments are so utterly salty, a huge amount of ‘copium’ as they say. It is literally like someone has killed their mothers or something. Ridiculous, they still get COD but that’s not enough. They all just want ‘exclusivity’.
The story of the US Senator claiming Sony and the Japanese government practice monopolistic anti consumer practices is one to watch too, I believe it, but the Japanese government has promised to investigate, because they want a trade deal with the US and as such the US won’t allow any anti competitive behaviour against US companies.
@S1ayeR74 lol, yes, anyone who particularly was rooting for the deal could have a lot of wry amusement reading that thread and some of the OTT responses!
I'm not so sure the US senator story has a lot of traction as what shes stating as 'someone told me' is completely and obviously misinformed and further undermined when a lot of her campaining funds seem to come from an MS source I don't think MS need any such obviously questionable statements to help them get this deal done, I don't believe it helps their cause...
@Valgore Well said mate. Gamers have a lot more in common than simply the box that delivers the pixels, and why some would wish to pin their colours to any uncaring corp is beyond me.
There is a certain 'wishing to belong' which encourages tribalism, but we are far more effective when we reject this and communicate with a little more thought and consideration. After all, a lot of more serious gamers have all the machines and options anyway these days...
I too will be glad o see this finished and behind us.
Yes, Let’s go! Don’t cry too hard about this Sony please.
@Titntin Why should it matter who gives her money? That's par for the course with the US and UK government, but that doesn't mean the Japanese aren't allowing advice monopolistic behaviour by their own home companies. We will see what happens but the US will demand and investigate fair treatment of its own companies use before any trade deal is signed.
And I suspect the 'someone told me' came along with some evidence too. Or it's a known practice in Japan that hasn't mattered until they want a trade deal with the US. I suspect there is smoke with this fire.
Guess we will find out as the year moves in. But as I understand the Japanese government has agreed to fully investigate it all. They haven't denied it at all.
Im clearly suggesting that this senators comments are not driven by an understanding of relevant facts or even a genuine concern, but by a need to pass on 3rd party comments from those she relies on for her bank balance! Motivation matters to me regardless of if it matters to you. It helps me understand the relevant weight I give to a particular viewpoint. The 98% figure she quoted, conviently forgetting all other games platforms except PS and Xbox, also gives rise to concern over validity, at least for me.
I'd be delighted if you could provide your source for the Japenesse government stating thy will investigate it, as I've not seen any such reports and would like to read any. I can see that the US trade representative has stated "there are currently discussions between the US and Japanese governments over the digital economy, “This is new for me, but let me take this back and I’m happy to follow up with you and your team on this”."
That's as much as Ive seen, but if you have a statement from Japan, Id love to see it, thanks.
Dont get me wrong, theres nothing wrong with looking into these shady practices, and Id like to see it happen across the board, but I havent seen the Japanese announce such an investigation, so Id like to learn more.
@bobbypaycheque
You can't play any Nintendo or Sony exclusives on a PC day 1.
And since I am technical... Since last generation, consoles are essentially PC hardware. The processors are custom but the CPU and GPU are combined to one chip and optimized. From a coding point of view there is not much difference developing for a PC/XSX/XSS/PS5.
@Kaloudz are you surprised? Some people take this stuff too seriously and he paid for it. Imagine getting that worked up over video games. Sheesh.
At least he can go get some fresh air and clear his head now …
@Titntin I did google it as someone in a video I saw made the claim, but so far I cannot find where it was reported that the Japanese government are investigating it all.
So I may well have spoken too soon on that. And I appreciate your suspicions. But I just think the concerns are justified in relation to any trade deal.
Many Senators are given money by big American companies, but it doesn't always mean foul play.
Still I don't appreciate this separation of high end consoles to low end ones like the Switch. They are all in the same market and gunning after the same customers.
@S1ayeR74 Thanks for looking... we get such a barrage of information these days its hard to keep up! Regardless of motivation it would be good if the senators statement did cast a light on any 'unsavory practices', but I suspect the message will be lost.... Time will tell!
I have to wonder if that 10 year deal offer is still on the table or, after Jim's "I don't want your deal" comment Phil will be sending him a "you snooze, you loose" txt
@NeoRatt I don't really see the point in playing Playstation exclusives day one, and you would be able to stop supporting a business practice you clearly disagree with. As for Nintendo Switch games on PC.... Totally not possible. Not at all. Not even a bit. Can't imagine it.
@Microbius This is fantastic.
@TooBarFoo been saying this the whole damn time if i was MS , if sony doesnt sign they would get NOTHING from me...id be like listen here was the 10 year deal with no exclusives... well you didnt like that so our new deal is 5 and youll have to wait 1 month for the game after it hits EVERY other system......take it or leave it.... id tell em you had the chance to sign the deal eveyone else signed months ago, i wouldnt punish those platforms that sign up early by giving sony the same exact situation when they wanted to be ***** about it.
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