A bit of wider industry news today. News which completely blows my mind - Microsoft are out to acquire Activision Blizzard. Pending all the regulatory approvals they need to go through which takes times and can be denied.
This continues the very worrying trend of these mega companies amassing huge resources. Microsoft now control a ridiculous amount of publisher and developer teams, easily helping towards more lock-in with Microsoft services and products. For Microsoft, it makes sense of course, since they can continue dumping titles into Game Pass and get more subscriptions for recurring revenue.
Activision Blizzard has been in a lot of hot water lately, which is probably a big understatement. Employees and investors have repeatedly called for the removal of the current CEO, Bobby Kotick. The press release is a bit vague on what will happen with Kotick, as it mentions Kotick "will continue to serve as CEO of Activision Blizzard" and then "Once the deal closes, the Activision Blizzard business will report to Phil Spencer, CEO, Microsoft Gaming". So it somewhat makes it sound like Kotick might only be there until the deal is fully done but it's pretty vague. Probably intentionally vague due to the ongoing issues. Update: Kotick will remain, a Microsoft spokesperson confirmed via email. Update #2: They tried to clarify again later that they were speaking generally about the acquisition so it's anyone's guess what will happen with Kotick (IGN).
This will be an "all-cash transaction valued at $68.7 billion" which is so much money I can't even begin to imagine it.
Microsoft will then own the likes of Activision, Blizzard and King studios with Warcraft, Diablo, Overwatch, Call of Duty, Candy Crash and global eSports activities through Major League Gaming. The press release states this will make Microsoft "the world’s third-largest gaming company by revenue, behind Tencent and Sony".
Since Microsoft isn't quite the same as the Microsoft of old, we might end up seeing more Activision Blizzard games come to Steam and so making it even easier to run them on Linux through Steam Play Proton. Imagine having Diablo, Starcraft, Overwatch, various newer Call of Duty games and so on being a few clicks away on Steam + Linux.
What do you think to this news? The deal is expected to close in 2023.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
LordDaveTheKind Jan 18, 2022
Quoting: GuestKotick needs to be the first one out the door after this.All the mess in the last months was probably the Trojan Horse Microsoft was looking for.
LordDaveTheKind Jan 18, 2022
How companies such as Valve would react? Would they try to negotiate with Microsoft for an extension of their Game Pass in the Steam Deck, if the latter had a successful outcome, as Gaben himself was hinting at in the previous months?
Last edited by LordDaveTheKind on 18 January 2022 at 2:40 pm UTC
LordDaveTheKind Jan 18, 2022
Quoting: GuestDon't forget Nintendo off that listI recall there are a few constraints on acquiring a Japanese company. Am I wrong?
Last edited by LordDaveTheKind on 18 January 2022 at 2:42 pm UTC
- Clippy
- The MehBox gaming console
- The "well it came with the computer" OS
buys the company that has basically had it's own money printing press from having 11+ Million people throwing money at their face every month + whenever they released a digital bling pack..
how..
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