No, the CMAs goal was “free, open and competitive cloud market to drive innovation and choice”. They said that multiple times. The most important licenses are now in Yves hands, which is not free, diverse, open or competitive by any means without regulator oversight. And they will need oversight because Ubisoft is in way more trouble than Activision was ever be in. There is a lot more of potential for fuckery here than if these ips where in the hands of MS or ATVI.
Oh, and now this 'free, open and competitive market" is in the hands of a French company.
What you have now is free and open. Anyone can bid for access to ABK games to stream. Just as they can do without an acquisition.
You seem to think that free and open means cloud rights free for everyone. It does not. It just means that they are available to the whole market. Which they are. ABK could have sold their cloud rights to anyone for any exclusive deal but that’s still a free and open market because anyone can have them.
The CMA were concerned that if MS had them there was a possibility the market was closed and nobody could have them in reality.
Far more than you, and most of the people here complaining, yes. You all need to calm down and stop throwing a tantrum every time there’s a development. This will ensure the CMA approves, the EU may reassess but they do that any time a material change is made (before or after initial approval), and no this doesn’t give the FTC a stronger case - they were already done for the 1000th time, and every analyst under the sun will back my claim, and even if they weren’t, this update absolutely destroys their entire claim about IP funneling.
Seeing some repeat behavior and some silences are going to start coming soon if the doomposting from usual suspects repeat (again, show me where there’s any indication that there’s room for concern as opposed to three months ago).
I have my doubts that cloud gaming brings in a valuable playerbase. There are too many variables that make cloud gaming difficult for the core gamer, this is a smart move from MS to please relations with Ubisoft and please regulators, there’s no way that in the next 15 years cloud gaming will become better.
There’s no way for us to know if it’s worth it or not until after the deal is done and MS’ internal goals are met.
And you’re assuming all of us are a fan of MS continuing to buy publishers after already acquiring two of them. My hope is they focus on studios going forward and not make any more attempts for publishers. Zenimax and ABK should be more than enough and if they aren’t, then MS’ strategy probably should be re-evaluated internally.
Microsoft and the CMA laid out a plan to the CAT and now the plan is not proceeding along the path that was outlined. I am not doomposting. The transaction will close imo, but i now wont be shocked if its in 2025 as the FTC gets more involved again as well. This is an absolute mess that theyve made. The CAT appeal appears to have been the much quicker way out, but I will be pleasantly surprised if the other regulators dont all reopen their investigations and pressure Microsoft again to drop it.
What existed with the agreement with the EU was a free, world-wide license for any streaming service to utilize CoD and ABK games. Now, those same companies will have to pay for those licenses and many probably won’t be able to afford them. This deal is far worse for everyone involved.
Ugh where did you get that this wasn’t the plan? The whole reason the CAT agreed to putting the case aside was because they had a big reason too IE this massive change to the deal. Again this isn’t something just sprung on Microsoft, they knew what was happening this whole time because they were talking with the CMA.
The deal ain’t going into a phase 2 either, it’ll get passed in phase 1 which ends on the October 18th, the deal should be closed by then.
Cloud gaming is exceptionally important. More than Microsoft lets on. As is call of duty. Thats why all these concessions come with expiry dates. Eventually it all works out.
I don’t disagree but the CMA didn’t like it as that free licence was entirely contingent on Microsoft confusing to play ball. And in their view at any time could decide not to. This deal removes that possibility.
I think cloud providers would still be able to stream Activision games free under the ‘buy your own game’ model, license fees apply to multigame subscriptions?
Prior to the Ubisoft deal, anyone who approached MS would get a 10-year deal based on the outlined EC commitments. Now it is at the discretion of Ubisoft.
Also, in the current deal, Microsoft still has significant leverage over any other cloud provider just by being the developer of the product. For example: Microsoft could easily waive usage fees in exchange for Xbox Cloud streaming rights (timed/exclusive). As the owner of the product, plus as a platform holder, Microsoft could leverage both ABK and the Xbox platform to get a better deal.
I don’t see how this is better than what was already presented.
