Phil is going to revive and greenlight Call of Duty Roman Wars as Ryse 2. I see his plan!
1 Like
Wait, about the Opening arguments podcast
Someone on Other era did a good summary:
*Their opinion is that the DoJ will almost definitely be filing a lawsuit before the end of 2022. What comes of it will be interesting, one of the main arguments is how MS could potentially lock down Call of Duty or other ActiBlizz IP exclusively to Gamepass, as in the only way you would be able to play it is subscribing to their service to force the growth, they want to see from it.
A settlement might also include guarantees to keep certain IP as console multiplatform as well, Call of Duty being the major one but potentially Crash and Spyro games still releasing on PS. It will be interesting to see what happens, I do not think it is a sure thing that the deal will go through, although I think it is more likely than not, itâs just not the foregone conclusion many assume it will be when comparing it to the recent Bethesda deal or the Disney/Fox deal.*
Iâm sorry but a lot of those concerns and speculation tends to be more on the extreme end of things, for example, COD is not going to be a game pass exclusive, it will still launch in retail channels.
And seriously? A settlement to keep Crash and Spyro games still releasing on PS or this could fall? I may not be an expert in these things, but I feel these guys are not the well informed in the gaming world.
13 Likes
Which is funny because Hoeg Law think this deal will go through without much problem. He also expected all games to become exclusive without any problem until Phil Spencer tweet besides contractual agreements.
And heâs an actual M&A lawyer.
4 Likes
Crash nor Spyro have been Playstation properties since eons âŚ
5 Likes
I thought it was a ridiculous opinion as well. Though your point about not being well versed in the gaming industry strikes me. Iâm guessing that will be persistent among a large swath of the public.
What really struck me was the host mentioned he himself was a playstation player but he didnât know what gamepass was. I was stunned at that.
1 Like
Maybe the guys are Sony fanboys living the nostalgia dream? It is laughble and ridiculous to think this deal could not go through because of crash and spyro skipping PS. Just shows how these guys put sony in the center of everything like a sacred and immutable entity in the gaming industry. It is PS cult.
6 Likes
The funny thing is in a strange way, youâll have to blame Sony in some form due to contract. If the contract said they must make CoD within those years, they must do it and no exception. So, they will be forced to do annually until 2023. After that, well we shall see.
1 Like
This was an interesting read and quote from an FTC Chair. Maybe they will opt out if charging this one hard.
Yet despite the tougher approach, FTC chair Lina Khanâwho has earned a reputation as a tough tech industry criticâhas indicated that the agency will choose its caseload carefully.
âWe have to make very difficult choices about which billion-dollar deals weâre going to ensure weâre closely investigating, but there are very real trade-offs in terms of what that work is going to come at the expense of,â Khan said last week. She added that regulators will focus their efforts on âinstances in which [enforcement] could really change the dynamic in the entire market.â
3 Likes
it looks like she will only go after an antitrust case if there is strong chance, she could win this doesnât look like she would win this one since MS has good counters to an anti-trust.
2 Likes
and probably did their research to make sure this would go through before announcing this deal
6 Likes
They do not want to get into another antitrust like during the 2000âs so they hired very capable lawyers to look through everything before announcing deals like this though i am curious about the EU or another European agency.
2 Likes
yep exactly
That alone tells me itâs probably gonna go through, the entire market will be fine me thinks. Sony arenât the entire market and theyâre the only ones who immediately will be impacted.
If you guys want some straight answers from a non biased perspective, or answers on other things related to MS and acquisitions. Listen to ColtEastWoods latest show with my favorite YouTube lawyer HoegLaw.
He doesnât dodge the questions and will answer to the best of his ability for even the most convoluted of scenarios.
Time stamps also included so you can skip to the parts you want
4 Likes
I am guessing what happened here is that lawyer was guessing MS would be particularly aggressive without realizing MS is already giving out assurances to Congress and making what seems like a CoD-related concession to Sony on the games releasing on PSX in the future. I bet he missed all of that and is kinda jumping the gun here. Not sure what day that episode was recorded tho.
And as we know from many years of discussions about the definition of exclusives all PS owners also have a super capable PC, so the simple solution is to release CoD on Xbox and PC only at retail and there will be no restriction on PS owners playing as they can buy it for their PCs 
.
5 Likes
More simply, heâs making up stuff, lmao, Crash and Spyro are strong arguments for FTC, really? Itâs like saying itâs now illegal to have exclusive games just because.
8 Likes
Sounds like it doesnât it lol. Beginning to sound like it is illegal for Microsoft to compete and the status quo market positions should be set in stone.
1 Like
I think MS has an implicit strong argument only by saying: âit was us or Facebook or Tencent.â Lol.
4 Likes
I mean Activision is looking to sell and the deal Microsoft has agreed can only really be done by other giant tech industries or sovereign wealth funds. The market, for obvious reasons, is very small.
3 Likes