Hey. No matter how much crap the guy gets, Death Stranding is the reason Ludens by BMTH even exists and that’s one of my favorite tracks of all time!
Microsoft’s top priority should be acquiring Splash Damage. They are making Outcasters, a Stadia exclusive. If that game is successful, I’m sure Google will buy them and add them to Stadia Games and Entertainment. Splash Damage makes Gears multiplayer content, Halo multiplayer content and they have also made Gears Tactics. Microsoft needs that studio because without them, the making of multiplayer content for both Halo and Gears would be a much slower process.
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Splash Damage was acquired by Tencent as part of Leyou i believe
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Leyou purchased Splash Damage when they started their spending spree a couple years back, so this is out of the question. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re starting to build small, satellite support teams within each large studio given all the hiring they’re doing.
Oh, okay. I didn’t know that. That’s actually very good for Microsoft.
Xbox does need to replace Splash Damage. There are good support studios like Skybox Labs, Certain Affinity and maybe Sumo. Skybox and Certain Affinity would be great pickups but Leyou (Tencent) own 10% of C.A.
Probably 1+1=3 thinking but the work for hire gigs 343 has with Certain Affinity & Skybox Labs might have more to it.
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Tencent also has dibs on buying out Certain Affinity. Skybox would be a good acquisition. If they wanna get bold, Virtuos would be a great buy but may lead to scrutiny if it cuts off other devs from access, particularly Sony.
Skybox Labs or someone like that makes sense as part of securing their pipeline (they’re codevving Halo Infinite). Certain Affinity has a 20% stake owned by Leyou in exchange for a big investment to help them make an original game - so they’re presumably not (short term) selling to anybody completely unless that is a disaster of some kind.
Splash Damage might still be available for another work-for-hire job like Gears Tactics, but at some point Tencent/Leyou will want to transition to making games for themselves, not for other people.
Saw some people mention Kojima. Pretty sure he has a three game deal with Sony. Remember reading it after he signed with Sony and he had that one on one introduction with Andrew House. He’s also confirmed that he’s in development on his next game. If it ends up being a PS5 exclusive and published by Sony, then I would say that the three game deal rumors/reports were true.
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Which is truly something that could happen - he is such a Prima Donna.
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Here we are with another clear statement from Phil that they’re looking for more teams, and that they’ll be in “buying mode” for the foreseeable future due to the meteoric rise of Game Pass. He also discusses a gap that he’d like filled from a portfolio standpoint, family-friendly dev/IP, and I really think Sega is the smart play yet again; it fills that gap with Sonic and the myriad of family-friendly IP Sega has and gives them some additional genre diversity with their PC/console output.
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Sonic, Yakuza, Persona, Streets of Rage, Jet Set, Valkyrie Chronicles, Monkey Ball… there is so much they’d get out of SEGA.
If they go for a publisher they’d still be my no. 1 pick.
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Your list did not include Crazy Taxi or ChuChu Rocket, I sentence you to 10 lashes.
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As usual friend, you and I are on the same page. There are still tons of other studios on my wish list (my recent one was a bit bigger than I thought it would be upon starting), but I don’t think there’s a more fitting publisher to become part of Xbox than Sega.
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One thing is clear, they will have many more studios.
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Let me make it up to you… I’m officially greenlighting ChuChu Taxi right now. Just need SEGA’s approval and for them to start making it themselves.
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I have 0 faith in 2020 Sega to create a Jet Set Radio (or any of their other awesome older IP).
But perhaps if Xbox acquires SEGA they can let other studios revive their IPs. That’d be nice.
E-rated content is interesting. Sports? Action Adventures? Platformers?
I would like another Zoo Tycoon.
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Hmmm E rated. A few things come to mind. Platformers, Party Games, Puzzle Games, Sports. Not a lot of studios jump to mind though.
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