Jim Ryan Reportedly Said: 'I Don’t Want a New Call of Duty Deal. I Just Want to Block Your Merger' - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 08 March 2023 / 8,827 Views
Sony Interactive Entertainment President and CEO Jim Ryan has reportedly stated he has no interest in working out a deal with Microsoft over Call of Duty and only wants to block Microsoft's Activision Blizzard acquisition.
This is according to Activision Blizzard EVP Corporate Affairs and CCO Lulu Cheng Meservey explaining that Microsoft offered Sony a 10-year agreement, which is better than any deal Activision Blizzard would give.
"Microsoft offered Sony (the dominant console leader for well over a decade, with 80% market share) a 10 year agreement on far better terms than Sony would ever get from us," said Meservey. "We've also offered Sony guaranteed long-term access to Call of Duty. But they keep refusing. Why?"
Meservey quoted Jim Ryan's words that was said during the behind closed doors hearing with the European Union regulators, the European Commission, on February 21, which explains why Sony hasn't agreed to any deals.
"I don’t want a new Call of Duty deal," Ryan reportedly said. "I just want to block your merger."
Microsoft and Nvidia have also signed a 10-year partnership to bring Xbox games on PC to the Nvidia GeForce Now cloud gaming service. The agreement will enable gamers to stream Xbox games on PC from GeForce Now to PCs, macOS, Chromebooks, smartphones, and more. If Microsoft's Activision Blizzard deal is approved it will bring games from Activision Blizzard to GeForce Now, including Call of Duty.
The CEO of SIE answered that question in Brussels.
— Lulu Cheng Meservey (@lulumeservey) March 8, 2023
In his words:
"I don’t want a new Call of Duty deal. I just want to block your merger.”
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.
More Articles
Realistically there is nothing that MS can offer Sony that would leave them better off than the status quo. The deal not going through is the best case scenario for Sony. Any compromise would leave them worse off. That is why Sony is fighting to stop it.
That is probably the most sensible take there will be lol.
What Sony highlighted is that adding COD to PSPlus will require them to pay the licensing fees which will require them to raise prices substantially. So the deal isn't good for them or their consumers. Microsoft wants this to happen because adding COD to GP will also require them to raise prices as well.
People need to back off of the console war stuff and really extrapolate what this means as consumers.
If a deal isn't made Microsoft will pull the plug whenever they want and PlayStation and it's consumers suffer again.
The best case scenario is to block the deal.
Sony already pays licencing fees, and then also pays for exclusivity deals. The deals are going away, and would be replaced then with Plus fees should the MS deal go through. What numbres do you have to suggest that the second is pricier than the first?
also, MS doesnt need to raise the price of anything, they can just "raise price" via a new sub, like they did with Ultrimate. A mobile-focused sub and the family sub are both effectively price raises (newer, more money), so an actual-clearly-its-a-price-raise is not needed (that is, a raide on already existing plans).
However that is not a reason or an excuse to block the merger.
They don't want competition. They are use to not having to work harder then that they normally do. Being number 1 for so long will do that. U get complacent
The had 23 studios for less than 2 year now and there were only 6 prior to e3 2018. And were do you see he's blaming Sony here? We all agree MS screwed up badly last gen and it's still affecting them today but they're getting back in the game and Sony just don't want that. They'll do anything to keep MS from growing too much too quick.
He is saying Sony is used to not working hard, guess PS3 era Sony won without moving a finger =p
That's not what is sayin though. Not working harder than you normally do does not mean you don't work hard. Is saying Sony want status quo and not be challenged.
But even then that's not blaming sony for anything unlike brimac suggested
Not wanting to work harder or be challenged is the desire of any company in the top anyway, but dany you can be sure is implying Sony never worked hard to get to the position PS is.
Ps3 only win right at the end when the new generation. It didn't win for the majority of that generation. That was the only outlier as wii won that time. Ps1, 2 and 4 Sony been number 1
And they didn't work hard at all the last 30 years right?
I am sure they did but they are getting complacent because they never had proper competition for a long time
Then it is time to ignore Sony and move ahead. Microsoft has already been way too generous. Ridiculous. I've said it before, nobody cared when Disney bought 100 billion dollars worth of content for their streaming service (Marvel, StarWars, all the old Fox Studio content). This is smaller than that.
Yes they did. Fox was forced to sell of a bunch of regional sports networks in order for the merger with Disney to be approved because having them under the same roof with ESPN would have given Disney too much power in the field of broadcast sports.
"They didn't lie, when they said they didn't want to take from others it was just for games that were already released"... people truly believe that.
MS said Bethesda game would be done a case by case basis, and made clear how they make that decision and nothing they have done since then, or promise to do with ABK, in contradiction to that. Do they want all of it exclusive? Sure. Does that ACTUALYL make business sense? You can likely make most of Bethesda exclusive and the risk of blowback vs increased mindshare is low. If you do that with CoD, the calculus changes. Also, now, you have way more scrutiny from regulators, and MS most certianly will want to make deals in the future.
Nope. Before the purchase it was "we aren't buying Bethesda to take away anything from other platforms", then few weeks latter it was "we can't comment anything else before the deal is done" (funny now they can comment a lot) and after the deal this case by case have been 100% new games not coming to PS. And that is why regulators are giving them a harder time now.
Link your claims of them lying? Otherwise you are spreading misinformation.
"The deal not going through is the best case scenario for Sony" I'm not really sure about that one. In fact, a part of me would like for this to be blocked, just to see what would be Microsoft's reaction aftewards.
The risk is that the deal goes through and Microsoft pulls Call of Duty off playstation out of spite.
No chance. The deal will go through, and MS will continue to release CoD on PS, at least for several years, so that they don't get a bunch of shit from regulators on their next deal.
In a nutshell yes, even though they would likely liked their internal docs remain unexposed to MS and the court, but that's only if the deal actually fail, that ABK don't retaliate for the deal failing and that MS ambition is tampered as a result. If the deal fail and MS decide gloves are off there's many ways to use $69B that could affect Sony way way worse. MS could poach every once of talent from Sony, increase 2nd party deals significantly (locking out some 3rd party from Sony), outbid Sony on every hat deal, and continue making acquisition (provide that the party being acquired have no CoD level franchise MS should be good to proceed).
Doesn’t make sense!!! MS has always had deep pockets but have underwhelming for years. The problem is they lack the heart and soul to grow and nurture their studios. They would be better off just investing that 69 billion into their existing 23 studios and start making great games consistently. I would prefer that they earn it that way.
What does not make sense is thinking this amount of investment may be used solely with organic growth.
Like said many time prior. $69B is literaly impossible to use growing organicaly and every indication other than last year is that organic growth rate is already maxed out. They could be adding an impossible 2000 employees a year and barely scracth this investment target.
But even if it was possible it would still result in talent drain at Sony through MS poaching them.
Ms always had deep pocket but lacked faith in Xbox to go all in. This $69B is the proof MS now have faith in xbox and the reason is simply gamepass. Now
If big acquisition is not a possibility anymore and organic growth is already maxed out through their annual budget there's not much you can do beside 2nd party deals, 3rd party hat and other acquisitions hence my prior post
100% agree. Sony fighting this is just normal and their CEO is doing his job properly :)
Does it suck for Xbox fans because the acquisition is just taking longert, yes, but come on this is 100% expected?
How would they be worse off when they are guarantee cod for at least 10 years with all the content which they had exclusive for years? Sony will still be getting the same revenue that they have been getting with cod annually.
10 years is enough time to create more and better things. reliance on brands you dont own or control never works out in the end. Sony did it to Nintendo and now MS will do it to Sony.
Xbox had already 20 years to do it... just saying.
Yea but Sony had longer. No company is perfect. They all do dumb decisions and ms made a huge one during xbox one era which caused them to catchup quickly now
And Sony had 30 years to do it... just saying.
Sony have been doing fine in consoles for those almost 30 years, so?
30 years to create a successor to CoD so they dont have to rely on a 3rd party game to stay on top.
CoD as a thing to care about is only 15 years.
Sony didn't need to worry about creating a successor to CoD before this year. Guess you are going to say MS didn't need to care about competing against PS for the past 20 years right?
It won't make financial sense for ms to not keep giving Sony cod. Cod makes the most money being on ps. After 10 years ms can always renew contract but charge more like with any contracts in the real world. At least when ms owns it, everyone can still play those ips. U are not locked to one console.
The thing is: If they don't make an agreement and the deal still goes through, Sony will be a lot worse off.
Not really, if and when the deal pass through the regulators will demand similar clauses or even harsher one than MS is currently offering, also if you have been seeing this soap opera of case MS have been "giving away" more by each week Sony keeps up the hard game.
This is getting a bit pathetic.
And she’s a reliable source for this… How?
She’s been quite unprofessional on twitter, paraphrasing and "interpreting" what is happening to fit her own narrative and agenda.
Exactly, she waits until 2 weeks later to say all this too. She's an absolute train wreck who just wants her check so she is riling up the mob on Twitter.
That is her job.
I'd say she's a pretty reliable source for this, because lying would leave her and/or Activison open to massive legal liability. It wouldn't surprise me if she's leaving out context that makes it sound less ridiculous. But, I think there is close to zero chance that she is outright making it up.
Show us where did 80% marketshare comes from since she is such reliable source.
I have no idea where that came from, and I'm not sure how that's relevant. We're talking about a different comment, and I clearly said that she's a pretty reliable source for this. She's a PR person talking about pending litigation. Her comments are all going to be backed up by something. She may leave out context, spin things in a way favorable to Activision, etc. But, she isn't going to outright lie, because she and/or her company would be totally fucked if she did.
That said, she is a human, so it is possible for her to make a mistake. But, my comments assume that what she's saying is not the result of a mistake.
The article have she claiming 80% marketshare for PS5.
PS5 or PS? There is a big difference here. PS4 and PS5 and PSN are still on the market and comparing them to the XB1 and XSX and LIVE will add up the stats shown.
Nothing mysterious about it. Sony told regulators that Nintendo doesn't matter because they chase a different gaming demographic than Xbox and Playstation chase. Sony claimed that Playstation and Xbox are in their own market segment called "HD" or "premium" consoles. Since Sony claimed that to the regulators, Xbox decided to show the regulators just how dominant Sony is within that "Premium consoles" segment. With Sony having 80% marketshare, the loss of CoD couldn't possibly cause Playstation fall behind Xbox in marketshare, that was the reasoning behind revealing the marketshare to regulators.
Because Sony said Nintendo isn't competition. So it's out of 2 competitors not 3 and MS followed on with a Pie Chart comparing PS to Xbox.
MS didn’t include Nintendo when they we’re doing the presentation to regulators.
And without Nintendo the marketshare is close to 60/40 in favor of PS than 80/20. MS is torturing numbers including PS4 and even PSVita in the argument even thought we are well into the current gen and sales of SW have majorly switched to it. When they say that 80/20 have been holding for several decades that denies X360 was above PS3 in europe for a long time and that even at the end they were quite closer than 80/20 and if we take it for current gen it isn't 80/20 as well, so they make a very specific case to make the claim stand but then expand on it.
Are you also including PSN and the PS4 in your logic? MS is talking about PS as a whole compared to Xbox as a whole. Not just this gen and hardware only. Its total market cap.
So MS MAU that is bigger than Sony mean something or not? Because I'm pretty sure you were preaching for several years that sales don't mean anything anymore it is all about subscription and reaching more markets... Xbox have bigger MAU but less revenue and profits on an order or 70/30 WW and 80/20 in Europe?
MAU on GP or Live? Pretty sure Sony have more MAU on PSN than Xbox. Unless you are referring to GP which Sony said isnt competition.
MS was the one putting their live MAU at something like 120-140M wasn't it? That is higher than PSN MAU. MS used pc, minecraft and a lot of other stuff to fluffy the numbers there, but then when trying to pass the deal they go "Sony is 4x bigger than us".
I read up the 80% to 20%, thats referring to only Europe.
Sony said GP is also not a competitor meanwhile sources are claiming they are blocking games going on GP.
I wouldnt be worried what MS is saying if this is what the market leader is doing.
Yeah, I just read up on this too. 80/20 refers to the European market.
Worldwide they claim it is 70/30. While MAU they claim is higher than PS.
Of course you don't worry Xbox isn't telling the truth.
Yeah Lulu shouldn't use the "80% market share" argument, in a specific hearing context that kind of made sense, not on a random tweet.
This should surprise zero people. Sony made it clear from the get-go that their intentions has been to block the deal.
This shouldnt be a suprise to anyone. Jim even stated that MS will butcher the PS version so they will have the inferior version... much like what Sony is doing now with CoD, keeping certain content off other versions.
This is getting desperate.
He is not talking content, he's talking performance. Sony never had Power to make Xbox version run poorly, have bugs, latency issues, etc., But MS Will have Power to screw Playstation version, and yes, It's hard deal with this only using behavioral remedies. Playstation reputation of having "good CoD" support can indeed be tarnished...
And with all the Xbox supported games on PS, where have they proven in doing this?
You mean like Outer Worlds spacer edition
https://www.pushsquare.com/news/2023/03/the-outer-worlds-new-ps5-version-has-some-really-disappointing-performance-issues
Okay so lets look at this as your example.
Firstly: PS5 on Paper is weaker than the Series X so the PS5 version won't be reaching the same peaks as the XSX.
Secondly: The PS5 version also has Dual Sense support something they didn't need to add since the XSX version cannot support it (Yet) but they did. God bless.
Thirdly: Let's wait and see if they patch the game and resolve these issues. Because you might be counting your chickens too early.
Forth: There are other games like Minecraft which works just as well on PS than it does on Xbox. So even if The Outer Worlds fail to live up to the Xbox version, other games do.
On paper but not in reality!!!!
Xbox didn't even publish this game and it seems to be having performance issues across the board, not just PS5.
Would that be to the fact that Xbox is the primary console so gets more development time. Lets think about this for a bit. Sony being the primary console gets more development time then MS so from a few titles that have come out like Protocol, it has better performance and more features. If this is the case with COD and PS well, that is the nature of the business and not some nefarious plot to make the PS version worse. So Sony will have to deal with a situation where they have not had to for a big AAA game.
Considering that Sony has never had the most powerful hardware for any given console generation - With the PS3 being the potential exception... (Xbox 360 had a better GPU) I don't think having inferior visuals has actually ever impacted Sony's sales.
PS4 was more powerful than XB1.
But the PS4 Pro was less powerful than the One X, I think it's his point
Pro versions came after the gen was already decided. And looking at exclusives PS3 had better performance than Xbox, and considering current gen most consoles from Xbox are series S. So I would say more often than not PS was showing better hardware than Xbox.
But he said "generation", not "ones released on 2013"
PS3 had better preformance than the 360? What?
The Playstation 3 had better CPU performance by a country mile.
But the Playstation 3 had a much inferior GPU.
A better CPU doesnt account for better visuals here. X1 had a better CPU than PS4.
The PS3 was heavily bottlenecked which is why the 360 outperformed it. 360 was a much more balanced system where as the PS3 wasnt. Too much focus on one area caused issues.
Look at the exclusives, by the end of the gen PS3 exclusives run and looked better than X360 exclusives.
You cannot gauge if a system is more powerful based on 1st party exclusives. Who is to say that these 1st party PS games wouldn't run better on the 360? History shows that the 360 could run games better, so if anything, more is in favor of the opposite to what you are claiming. Also, it depends on the budget of a game and its focus priorities.
By the end of the gen several multiplatform games were running better on PS3. But if you want to discount all first party and look at only 3rd party, a lot of them are running better on PS5 than on Series X, guess PS5 is stronger then.
What games were running better on the PS3? (Outside of 1st Party games) Any tech expert will tell you that the 360 was a more capable system. It had a better GPU and a better Ram setup meanwhile the PS3 was heavily bottlenecked with its GPU and Ram. PS3 had a more powerful CPU and that was it. The CPU cannot do everything and it showed early. Devs literally complained and had to work around the bottlenecks with the PS3 design.
The XSX and PS5 share very similar hardware designs with the XSX pipping it in all categories except the SSD. The answer you are looking for is optimization. Same as how we see games load better on XSX when it has a slower SSD. It all comes down to devs and their focused platform and how much time they spend on other versions. Some versions have more time spent being optimized than others.
The 360 wasn’t really a more capable console. It was an easier one to tap into its full potential, thanks to its superior GPU and more efficient memory architecture.
The PS3 could reach similar result but required more work to achieve parity, and that’s something few third parties felt the necessity to do.
When all is said and done, both were pretty much equal in capabilities. One was simply a more efficient , less alien architecture.
Thank god Sony woke up after this and built a console focusing on the dev side of things, instead of keeping with their proprietary hardware ambitions.
Oh I know what his point is and its wrong is what it is. It’s the PS4/XB1 generation not the Pro/OneX generation. They were a small blip on the tail of that gen. The One X was manufactured for only 2 and a half years at the end of the gen and accounted for very little install base. As Don said, the gen was already decided when those skus came out and it made little difference. When people look at the generation as a whole, it’s the PS4/XB1 generation and in that generation PS4 was more powerful than XB1. There’s probably close to 100M PS4’s out there not including the Pro model and considering all the head to head comparisons through the initial years, PS4 was more powerful and that’s a fact. He’s stretching and moving the goal post at the end of a gen to try and prove his point. He’s encompassing a whole generation when his point should be about specific models and he’s wrong in doing so. He went back to PS3 and totally ignored 100M PS4’s that are still selling today on this very site. Did 2013 not happen in his mind? Did History just not exist during that time period? Like I said, I understood his point but that doesn’t mean he’s right.
No. It's not wrong. Move on.
The Xbox One X is the most powerful console for the generation and that was my original point.
-you- trying to shift the goal post, which is a logical fallacy does not and will not change that intrinsic fact.
The amount of sales the consoles got is also irrelevant. The Nintendo 64 was more powerful than the Playstation 1. Still lost.
The Playstation 2 was vastly inferior technically to the Gamecube and Original Xbox, but dominated the generation.
So the amount of sales a console has, doesn't change how powerful a console is... And is thus irrelevant.
The Xbox One X merely existing is the only requirement for Xbox winning the performance crown for last gen.
Nope, your point was that PS having the weaker HW in a generation didn't affect it winning against Xbox. In that case since the generation was already decided long before the Pro versions released, PS4 was stronger than X1 (not that was the reason for the victory).
Playstation 4 is stronger than the base Xbox one. No one... And I mean no one has argued otherwise.
Sales is irrelevant.
But that same generation also has the Xbox One X and Playstation 4 Pro.
The Xbox One X dominated the Playstation 4 and Playstation 4 Pro's technical specifications.
I go back to this on your post "(Xbox 360 had a better GPU) I don't think having inferior visuals has actually ever impacted Sony's sales"
Considering PS2 launch was 1.5 year before GC and Xbox, PS3 was about on par (and that point it was having a hard time getting traction on sales), PS4 had already won when Pro came out... going on that line of thought you can't really say that X1X being stronger than PS4Pro validates the notion that PS being weaker than Xbox doesn't impact sales, PS2 it already had won when Xbox released, PS3 it barely outsold X360 by the end of the gen, PS4 it had already won when Pro versions released. So the only gen where PS was both weaker than Xbox (but well S is the main console for MS, and no question on it being weaker) and the gen wasn't won even before it showed are PS3 and this one, on PS3 it may have mattered and in this one it doesn't seem to matter.
You are just making excuses bud.
It doesn't matter if the PS2 launch was earlier.
It doesn't matter who won the generation in terms of console sales.
It doesn't matter if the PS3 sold similar to the 360.
My statement was about who had the most powerful hardware for any given generation, that was it. That is all there is to it.
The fact that upsets you and you are trying to shoe-horn and twist other excuses into my original statement is just bizarre.
The Xbox One X was faster than the Playstation 4 and Playstation 4 Pro by a significant margin... And thus won that generation in terms of performance.
The Xbox Series X is faster than the Playstation 5 without any doubt. - If Sony releases a faster Playstation 5 variant and Microsoft does not, then Playstation 5 will win the generation on hardware.
The only generation where Sony had any leg-up on the competition in terms of power was the 7th gen thanks to it's significant CPU advantage and that showed in exclusives.
But you’d be disingenuous to dismiss the way the gen played out from the start, with how widely known it was that Sony released the stronger console this time and how it made consumer choose the PS4 over the XBox One.
The mid-gen refresh came too late, after years of Sony having indeed the strongest console.
We are discussing what you brought regarding the power relating to winning or not a generation not "who had the most powerful hardware by the end of the generation", but if you want to ignore half your own post to say you won go ahead.
Exactly, he’s trying to force his opinion on the matter as a fact for an entire generation. No one is upset about it, we are just pointing out that he is wrong and that he is not the end all decider of that gen. When history looks back at the PS4/ XB1 generation the common census is that the PS4 was superior in sales and power. That’s what the players of that gen are going to remember. If any major outlet like IGN put out a survey on it, people are most likely going to share that opinion. History doesn’t lie as that’s what the books are going to say and it doesn’t matter that Pemalite on vgchartz.com says otherwise. He wants to move on with that opinion so that’s that.
History also says that the Xbox One X was superior to the Playstation 4 in terms of power.
that is certainly true, but wasn't the point of the discussion.
I said for "any given console generation".
Xbox One X > Playstation 4 and Playstation 4 Pro without contest.
Any other deviation from that statement like DoneFerrari "It came later in the gen" is thus irrelevant to my original point.
Damn you Sony ! Lulu and Boby want their check !
Problem is Microsoft is just hard to trust!!! Just look at what they were saying before the Bethesda deal and what happened afterwards. Regulators are not dumb!!!!
This acquisition is apparently a good enough reason for everyone (and I mean everyone) to talk absolute bullshit all the time. The stuff said gets more and more ridiculous and the frequency on bullshit takes is incredibly high.
So since it is on his words there are records of it right? And meetings occurring behind closed doors should totally be leaked. And sure playstation have 80% marketshare... Lulu is great
MS is basically saying we suck and Sony’s great so please please please let us have Activision.🙏
Oh and by the way we don’t care if it’s the beginning of a monopoly!!!
This just tells me that you still want more deals and most importantly, you don't want your dominance challenged.
Ryan is basically offering a direct challenge without even realising it, or he does and he's confident it won't be challenged.
That's the real reason why they are whinging. They don't want competition and leave it as status quo
I understand why they have to do it but it’s always uncomfortable watching people debase themselves for material advantage.
Sony’s behavior over this entire saga is unbecoming at best and flatly embarrassing at worst. This behavior and whining should be beneath them.
Wow-really weird take! Sony has been very quiet overall while MS/ Activision are constantly out there in the media just like LuLu today !!!
Wow! But where is the proof he said that?
believe all women I guess
None, but then again Ryan could always say she is lying. Either way it does not change anything. Of course Sony want to block the deal. Its not like its any secrete. Whether Ryan said it out loud or not its been pretty clear from the start that this deal does absolutly nothing for Sony and as a business its to their best interest to get the best deal they possibly can from this merger if they cannot block it.
However that's no excuse to hold your competitors back.
Hopefully the deal goes through and Microsoft remove CoD from PS completely. Have it on every platform possible, except PS. The kind of pettiness Sony is showing deserves consequences.
I wouldn't be so quick to say that adding Nintendo and Nvidia would not come close to what COD makes on PS. Both systems have a huge install base. Instead I would just say that MS really have not intention of making COD exclusive because it prints money. Including Nintendo, Sony, Nvidia, Steam, Epic you name it keeps COD on as many users hands as possible. A billion dollar franchise is a lot of money to just throw away over some petty feelings, this is business.
Jim Lyin just admitted that there is 0 reason to negotiate with him. Which is what Xbox should have done all along.
No point in hearing Sony’s point of view if those disingenuous liars are wasting everyone’s time ignoring all negotiations.
Let Xbox set the terms of the CoD deal, and then let the cultish Ponies suffer the consequences.
Should have always been a time limit for Sony to accept a desl, and if they don’t in time, then completely withdraw the offer.. and see them begging afterwards.
Would be really cool to see MS withdrawing the offer, that would certainly help their case =p
