Well, the results are here. In the USA the FTC was trying to block Microsoft from acquiring Activision Blizzard but Microsoft has won the fight. Now Microsoft are one big step closer to actually properly closing the deal, and a rather big consolidation of the gaming industry given how big Activision Blizzard are.
As per the decision:
Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision has been described as the largest in tech history. It deserves scrutiny. That scrutiny has paid off: Microsoft has committed in writing, in public, and in court to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation for 10 years on parity with Xbox. It made an agreement with Nintendo to bring Call of Duty to Switch. And it entered several agreements to for the first time bring Activision’s content to several cloud gaming services.
This Court’s responsibility in this case is narrow. It is to decide if, notwithstanding these current circumstances, the merger should be halted—perhaps even terminated—pending resolution of the FTC administrative action. For the reasons explained, the Court finds the FTC has not shown a likelihood it will prevail on its claim this particular vertical merger in this specific industry may substantially lessen competition. To the contrary, the record evidence points to more consumer access to Call of Duty and other Activision content. The motion for a preliminary injunction is therefore DENIED.
This means the temporary restraining order against the acquisition will be removed on July 14th, unless the FTC obtains a "stay pending appeal from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals".
Microsoft still have a fight ahead in the UK though, since the CMA (Competition and Markets Authority) blocked the deal but naturally Microsoft is appealing the decision with a hearing set to begin on July 28th. So they're not completely out of the woods yet but it's probable Microsoft will end up winning there too. Update 16:21 UTC - Brad Smith, Vice Chair and President Microsoft, put a statement on Twitter:
After today's court decision in the U.S., our focus now turns back to the UK. While we ultimately disagree with the CMA’s concerns, we are considering how the transaction might be modified in order to address those concerns in a way that is acceptable to the CMA. In order to prioritize work on these proposals, Microsoft and Activision have agreed with the CMA that a stay of the litigation in the UK would be in the public interest and the parties have made a joint submission to the Competition Appeal Tribunal to this effect.
What do you think to this outcome?
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Quoting: mr-victoryHmmm . . . how fundamentally incompatible with Wine? Like, what are the chances it could be made to work? Or is it a legal incompatibility?Quoting: Purple Library GuyI don't have a good memory for acronyms; what's a UWP?Universal Windows Platform. The package format used by Microsoft Store and PC Game Pass. UWP is incompatible with Wine, therefore anything in UWP is a no-go on Linux. The problem is that if Actibilzzard games get locked down to Game Pass or MS Store they cannot be played on Linux.
mr-victory Jul 12, 2023
Quoting: Purple Library GuyHmmm . . . how fundamentally incompatible with Wine?AFAIK UWP apps use totally different APIs which aren't implemented in Wine so to get an UWP app running, a lot of functions should be added to Wine. Nobody has bothered to do this yet.
Quoting: HelmetI don't really like the whole monopoly going on, but maybe it'll be some kind of good. I mean, we've got Halo Infinite on Steam deck. Maybe it'll be a boon for Linux gaming in some indirect way. Maybe Activision and Blizzard games will come to Steam instead of needing another launcher.
So, the Activision games are pretty much all available on Steam. The couple CoD games that were BattleNet only for PC were all released on Steam, as well as the latest one. Also, the last couple Crash and Spyro games were on Steam. The only recent one that had a PC release that I can think of that is not on Steam is Tony Hawk 1 + 2, which is on Epic Store. (Crash Team Racing: Nitro-Fueled didn't have a PC release.)
boltronics Jul 13, 2023
MS will get a small studio to revive Activision's Dark Reign franchise. It gets followed up a year later with a big StarCraft cross-over spin-off.
All coming to Steam too! (And mobile, but whatever.)
EA will now recognise this underserved gap in the market, and fight back hard to compete with new AAA blockbusters of EA's C&C/RA franchises.
Hey I can dream!
wvstolzing Jul 13, 2023
Quoting: GroganThere's no way they'd have chosen that mickey mouse operating system on its own merits. DOS (well, CP/M at the time) was utter garbage, it was sold for a song
CP/M wasn't garbage (http://www.digitalresearch.biz/CPM.HTM); it was doing very well at the time (all the beefier micros capable of doing any sort of serious work had a port of it; it was a serious breakthrough in making micros useful for office work. Even the C64 got a cartridge extension eventually). Digital Research & Gary Kildall almost made the deal with IBM; as to why it fell through, there are many legends -- though I wouldn't rule out secret MS interference.
MS then paid a small company in Seattle to put together a shitty clone of CP/M; I believe they had some sort of distribution agreement with Digital Research; so essentially they breached whatever agreement was in place, & then plagiarized the software into DOS. Then they convinced (?!) IBM to license it per machine -- a trick that Bill Gates had tried on Commodore earlier w/ respect to BASIC, only to get rejected by Commodore's founder & then-CEO Jack Tramiel. Tramiel told Gates, "I'm already married."
Last edited by wvstolzing on 13 July 2023 at 3:55 pm UTC
Quoting: wvstolzingHa!Quoting: GroganThere's no way they'd have chosen that mickey mouse operating system on its own merits. DOS (well, CP/M at the time) was utter garbage, it was sold for a song
CP/M wasn't garbage (http://www.digitalresearch.biz/CPM.HTM); it was doing very well at the time (all the beefier micros capable of doing any sort of serious work had a port of it; it was a serious breakthrough in making micros useful for office work. Even the C64 got a cartridge extension eventually). Digital Research & Gary Kildall almost made the deal with IBM; as to why it fell through, there are many legends -- though I wouldn't rule out secret MS interference.
MS then paid a small company in Seattle to put together a shitty clone of CP/M; I believe they had some sort of distribution agreement with Digital Research; so essentially they breached whatever agreement was in place, & then plagiarized the software into DOS. Then they convinced (?!) IBM to license it per machine -- a trick that Bill Gates had tried on Commodore earlier w/ respect to BASIC, only to get rejected by Commodore's founder & then-CEO Jack Tramiel. Tramiel told Gates, "I'm already married."
Wasn't it called "QDOS" for "Quick and Dirty OS"?
wvstolzing Jul 13, 2023
Quoting: Purple Library GuyQuoting: wvstolzingHa!Quoting: GroganThere's no way they'd have chosen that mickey mouse operating system on its own merits. DOS (well, CP/M at the time) was utter garbage, it was sold for a song
CP/M wasn't garbage (http://www.digitalresearch.biz/CPM.HTM); it was doing very well at the time (all the beefier micros capable of doing any sort of serious work had a port of it; it was a serious breakthrough in making micros useful for office work. Even the C64 got a cartridge extension eventually). Digital Research & Gary Kildall almost made the deal with IBM; as to why it fell through, there are many legends -- though I wouldn't rule out secret MS interference.
MS then paid a small company in Seattle to put together a shitty clone of CP/M; I believe they had some sort of distribution agreement with Digital Research; so essentially they breached whatever agreement was in place, & then plagiarized the software into DOS. Then they convinced (?!) IBM to license it per machine -- a trick that Bill Gates had tried on Commodore earlier w/ respect to BASIC, only to get rejected by Commodore's founder & then-CEO Jack Tramiel. Tramiel told Gates, "I'm already married."
Wasn't it called "QDOS" for "Quick and Dirty OS"?
Yeah that's what the 'clone' was initially called.
Also I shouldn't have said '... all the beefier micros had it ...' -- more precisely, CP/M was written for the 8080 processor, so it worked on micros that had an Intel 8080 or a Zilog-80 clone of the intel. C64, The Apple II, etc. were 6502 based to they got expansion cartridges or cards. Digital Research later released a 'multitasking' DOS, a Mac-clone GUI layer for the Atari 16 bits, etc. The company got sold off, though; & Gary Kildall met an untimely death. He was reportedly very bitter that the 'micro' revolution of the late 70s-early 80s got hijacked by scum like Gates, or the a$$hole salesman Jobs. He had a lot of respect for Steve Wozniak though.
Quoting: RaabenI can't see the UK staying their ground being the lone opposition now. In a way I guess I am glad I have my huge backlog and emulation to last me years and years to come; I hate the way the gaming industry is going lately. I have no confidence in everything being devoured by corporate entities too big for entire nations to touch.
I do envy you for having a backlog I have long ago finished all the games I wanted to play now waiting for the next elder scrolls game and hoping the graphics card needed to play it won't require selling organs or my first born to buy but knowing Nvidia grees it's possible
Last edited by 14 on 15 July 2023 at 4:25 am UTC
Quoting: 14I don't hate companies for being successful. But I don't like this. It's simply too much market control. I am baffled that Bell (telephone company) was broken up but not this. What the hell.Bell was broken up back in the day when antitrust law was taken seriously. Things are different now, although even in the US there are signs of change back towards a more aggressive approach.
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