186
Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard
(darkfriend.social)
From video gaming to card games and stuff in between, if it's gaming you can probably discuss it here!
Please Note: Gaming memes are permitted to be posted on Meme Mondays, but will otherwise be removed in an effort to allow other discussions to take place.
See also Gaming's sister community Tabletop Gaming.
This community's icon was made by Aaron Schneider, under the CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.
On one hand this just means further consolidation of an already oligopolic industry. On the other hand, Activision is a terrible company run by a terrible man, so it's not like things could get much worse.
To be honest, this is why I've been of two minds regarding the whole thing.
ActivisionBlizzard needs a complete structural change. That's not going to happen without someone else acquiring them, which they were seeking out themselves.
That it's Microsoft who did that kind of sucks, but if not them, it probably would have just been someone like Embracer who's also currently consolidating a lot of IP. Tencent is another option.
If Sony acquired them, it would have led to the same fight, only it'd be Microsoft complaining.
I understand why Microsoft is probably one of the worse options here, due to Game Pass and having their own console, but I don't think there was ever going to be a good outcome for everyone here. It was ActBlizz who wanted to sell and it was never going to be a cheap acquisition.
Some other deal would have gone through (and be challenged), and I think people would still have issues with it regarding their market share.
Microsoft are the best option by far.
Sony wouldn't, and shouldn't, be allowed to buy them even if they could afford them. They're the market leader and we know they would make everything exclusive straight away.
The only other options are companies like Embracer, Tencent, Amazon, or Apple. None of them would be good. Microsoft are basically going to maintain the status quo, while opening up the games to more people on more services.
Sony has bought exactly 1 existing game of note, Destiny, and neither it or Bungies next game going to be Playstation exclusives.
Microsoft has bought all of Zennimax and will be taking all future games off Playstation.
So I don’t know what you’re basing your points on.