What do you think about the acquisition of King and MS preparing to enter in the super competitive Mobile market?

[FarSightXR-20]

I think this is an overlooked aspect of the Activision acquisition: if the deal goes well, Xbox will become de facto one of the main players in the highly competitive mobile space (Candy Crush, COD Mobile, etc).

Although there is way way bigger than King (Tencent, Zynga…) as the mobile market is a lot more competitive and crowded than the console market, but King is for sure way way way bigger than Bethesda’s Alpha Dog Games with like 30 or 50 people.

And what this could mean for Game Pass along the road.

And as every major player like Supercell ($8.6B in 2016), Glu ($2.4B in 2021), Zynga ($12.7B this year), King ($5.9B in 2016) were being swallowed up by either EA, Tencent, T2 or Activision, you could think that the door was more and more closed for MS or that they weren’t interested that much (even though they had Fallout Shelter, Minecraft or recently a deal with Tencent’s Timi to make Return to Empire in China).

Windows Central wrote an interesting article about that

https://twitter.com/WCGamingTweets/status/1483869723544539139

By acquiring King and Activision, Microsoft is finally getting what it needs to compete in the mobile space: developers and publishers who know how to both make and effectively advertise mobile games with satisfying gameplay loops and a good balance of free-to-play features and paid ones. Games like Candy Crush, Farm Heroes, and Bubble Witch have proven so popular that King made $652 million in revenue during the third quarter of 2021, and Activision Blizzard’s Call of Duty Mobile has also remained a dominant title since its launch in 2019. Diablo Immortal, an upcoming mobile game version of Activision Blizzard’s beloved action roleplaying series, has also been received positively during beta tests. Assuming the acquisition deal goes through, things are looking very good for Microsoft’s future in this market.

Over the last several years, Microsoft has made several attempts to break into the mobile space. The mobile version of Minecraft: Bedrock Edition and Fallout Shelter have both done well, but releases like Gears Pop!, Forza Street, and Minecraft Earth were generally disliked due to their lackluster gameplay mechanics. The games also had overly aggressive paywalls and microtransactions too, which made it difficult to enjoy the game as a free-to-play player and even forced players to spend real-world money to make meaningful progress in some cases. The old Halo: Spartan Assault and Spartan Strike games fared better, but failed to truly succeed due to their initial exclusivity to Windows Phone and $4.99 upfront asking price.

Mobile Mavens: industry reactions to Microsoft's acquisition of Activision...

Where it gets interesting is that Microsoft will also own mobile publisher King. If you look at the earnings numbers from Q2 2021, the King team (33 per cent) generated more revenue than Blizzard (23 per cent). Microsoft will be able to use King’s team to further build out their rich franchise portfolio, mirroring how King developed a mobile game for Crash Bandicoot that reached 27 million downloads just in two weeks. Just imagine Fallout’s Pip-boy or Doomguy in a similar runner!

For the Metaverse + E-Sport as well:

As the owner of Minecraft, Microsoft was already a big player in the metaverse. The acquisition of Activision Blizzard might just make it the de facto leader. It fuses Microsoft’s expertise in technology such as cloud computing with Activision’s development capabilities across all platforms, not to mention player base of 400 million and Call of Duty and Overwatch esports leagues. It’s an ideal platform from which Microsoft can launch its vision of the metaverse.

[Ulster36thDiv]

I was thinking earlier… what if they somehow in the far future launched their games on their own free to play mobile section of the gamepass app.

They’d cut out Google Play for their 30% cut of any revenue from Candy Crush etc.

[SuikerBrood]

That graph kinda says it all, doesn’t it? I have no interest in mobile games but for a business it makes sense to be part of this medium. Obviously Microsoft stepped in really late. I do mostly see it as a different business venture within Microsoft Gaming, which will give Spencer and the leadership team more room to invest, like the Mojang acquisition did. For Microsoft as a whole, it’s probably one of the reasons this deal went through.

[TechnicPuppet]

Candy Crush is a great game if the stuff that makes it annoying could be removed. It would make no money but I’d pay full console price for it so I’d be happy.

[JonnJonzz]

Even though the mobile market isn’t my cup of tea, I know there is more money to be made from the mobile game market.

So this might even make it so MS goes after mobile game developers like Mistwalker, Level-5 or Thatgamecompany.

So I’d be fine with that.

[Biggzy (Hassan)]

@SuikerBrood

For Microsoft as a whole, it’s probably one of the reasons this deal went through.

Definitely. You see comments how Microsoft could have gotten this publisher or these developers for the amount of money they are going to spend, but none of them would give Microsoft the door to enter in the mobile space in a big way.

When Satya and Phil talk about reaching billions of gamers they are referring to mobile as well.

[Sparda3g]

One thing is certain: we will see Candy Crush featuring Master Chief.