Microsoft Launches Website Dedicated to Activision Blizzard Deal - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 03 October 2022 / 3,157 Views
There has been some opposition to Microsoft's proposed Activision Blizzard deal, including from Sony and Google. The CMA in the UK following its initial investigation announced is doing a more "in-depth Phase 2 investigation to reach a decision that works in the interests of UK gamers and businesses." While the deal has been approved in Saudi Arabia.
Microsoft has now launched a website dedicated to its proposed Activision Blizzard acquisition that was announced in January of this year.
The website explains why Microsoft thinks the deal will benefit gamers and Xbox owners. "Our vision for gaming: More choice and more games for people everywhere," reads the headline on the website.
"Giving players choice in how they play their games makes gaming more accessible and leads to larger, more vibrant communities of players," said Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer. "Choice is equally important to developers. Developers benefit from having a diversity of distribution and business models for their games. Choice unlocks opportunities for innovation and enables the industry to grow."
Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith added, "Too much friction exists today between creators and gamers; app store policies and practices on mobile devices restrict what and how creators can offer games and what and how gamers can play them. Our large investment to acquire Activision-Blizzard further strengthens our resolve to remove this friction on behalf of creators and gamers alike. We want to enable world-class content to reach every gamer more easily across every platform."
Read Microsoft's list of "Benefits of Xbox + Activision Blizzard" below:
Benefits of Xbox + Activision-Blizzard
Benefits for players
- More games on more devices including Xbox, PlayStation, phones and online
- Choice in how and where people buy games with subscription and one-off purchase options
- For the 95% of gamers who play on phones, alternatives to gaming offerings from the dominant mobile platforms
Benefits for game creators
- More ways to get games in front of more players through support, investment and better access to gamers
- Better revenue and fair marketplace rules through our app store principles
- Greater flexibility in payment systems and the experience they provide their fans
Benefits for the gaming industry
- More competition in mobile, where a couple of big players dominate
- Greater competition in traditional gaming, where Sony and Nintendo will remain the biggest
- Emphasis on positive workplace culture and increased local investment from Microsoft in studios and creative ecosystems around the world
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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"Greater competition in traditional gaming, where Sony and Nintendo will remain the biggest"
"Traditional" is the key word here and masks the overall picture.
2021 gaming revenue:
Sony: $24.87 billion
Microsoft: $16.28 billion
Nintendo: $15.3 billion
Activizion Blizzard: $8.8 billion
Microsoft + Activizion Blizzard = $25.08 billion.
If we follow 2021 revenue, that would put the 'underdog' Microsoft at number 1 out of the big 3.
I'm commenting in the comment section on this particular article. I could write an essay on the overall subject but this is hardly the place for that. I'm not sure what you're expecting of me.
That's also just completely incorrect. Sony have been primary talking point in relation to this deal since the beginning. It's intrinsically linked to their business to the point it crashed their stock price when it was announced. Sony are Activizion Blizzards number one business partner. The ongoing disputes between the two companies make headlines on an almost weekly basis.
Embracer and Tencent have basically no relevance whatsoever to this deal.
So after the buyout, they will be almost equals.
This is so cringe! MS are starting to look really whiny.
Funny you should say that when jim is crying almost every other week about this deal.
I can't really blame them for sugar-coating it (they are buying Candy Crush after all), but if we're being real those three benefactors should be: Game Pass subscribers, stockholders and Microsoft.
Is it wrong to laugh?
Strange seeing a company do something like this. Watch, Sony's going to release their own website in protest ?.
*Choice in how and where people buy games with subscription and one-off purchase options.
The only fair point... Since they have gamepass, but....
all others are bullshit!
desperate
This hypocritical talk is why I and many others have lost a good deal of respect for Phil Spencer. He’s said numerous times now things such as “the more people who can play a game, the better it is for everyone.” But then they do things like buy Bethesda and scrap the years-in-development PS5 version of Starfield to make it XB exclusive.
And they try to buy ABK but will only guarantee a few years of access to CoD for PS players.
No one really likes Jim Ryan, and on most accounts, Phil Spencer does a far better job, but he seems very disingenuous and fake. And that’s something that always annoys me. He seems to make a lot of comments to try to make himself look like a good person or MSFT like a good, virtuous corporation; but, his/their later actions often prove they’re full of BS. There are a lot of reasons I’d choose Phil Spencer over Jim Ryan, but in this area, I find Phil Spencer’s fakeness incredibly obnoxious.
The funniest one: "more games on more devices including sony"
And then its jimbo thats its the one being pathetic right.
Yes we can agree on that much.
You care more this kind of stuff than ps and xbox users here in vgchartz, arent you a pc gamer. You hate sony and jimbo but you sure love them sony first party games dont you ? How can you hate them and want sony harm but then in other threads you want their games and you salivate thinking you can play them on your pc.?
Thats where your getting it wrong. I dont hate Jimbo or Sony. If i did like you say why would i want Sony games on PC?. Its clear what annoys me is the same few Sony fans on this site that will defend Sony's jimbo like in them other articles but when it comes to MS they act completely different. For instance they defend Jimbo when he made comments in that other article when he was being cringe but now call out MS for being cringe in this one. Jim is cringe for acting the way he has been acting lately and well this is cringe from MS. If you notice in any of my comments towards Sony its never really Sony i do be calling out but instead pointing out to some fans how they are being kinda hypocritical for trowing fudge at Ms every chance they get but cant do the same when it comes to Sony. I have had PS consoles since the PS1 to the PS4 and some of my best gaming memory's are on PS consoles so clearly i enjoy Sony games i just dont have a need or want for owning a PS or Xbox console anymore.
Well, that's a huge load of corporate horseshit if I ever saw it. Hopefully MS has this site of theirs hooked up to Facebook so people can throw laugh reacts at it.
Poor old trillion dollar company!
Leave us alone! We're only trying to cuckoo out way to the top of the game industry because we failed doing it ourselves.
Again, I don’t think anyone says it’s entirely apples and oranges, but I think you could fairly objectively say that Sony’s fairly consistent pattern of buying studios they’ve personally worked with and helped foster, typically over years, is quite different from MSFT using their massive, endless cash pile to literally buy their way into first place. Do I blame them? No. Why wouldn’t they? It’s the government who’s supposed to take charge and regulate this so that the largest corporations don’t get to have such a massive advantage over much smaller companies and endlessly and logarithmically grow.
I understand what you are saying. My point was they all do it. No ones a Saint.
You can say the same as cod and all games that Activision has released on xbox , started since og xbox. That's a longtime before buying them outright.
Same with when Sony bought naughty dog in 2001.they would have made the 3 crash games during ps1 before being bought outright.
Same with Bethesda as it started from at least morrowimd or even earlier which is a long time away before bing purchased.
Even with the current purchase ms is far from being number 2 let alone number 1. We all know ms loves to share which Sony never does unless it was written in an agreement like how it was for bungie
The benefits for gamers are mild at best, if any.
Those games already come to subscription services and every storefronts…
Activision games have never been on Game Pass. What other sub service have they been on?
I got many CoD games from PS+, Crash Bandicoot 4, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 1+2, and quite a few others.
This specifically is referring to Game Pass. It's nice PS has gotten some but you're glooming over the benefit for Game Pass users when all the games will be accessible from the service. I would hardly call that mild.
I can’t remember these games coming to GamePass. Them being on GamePass puts them on tons of new devices. Possibly even Switch as well.
That they have the gall to do such thing..
Essay Pro