I think everyone is on the table.
MS is hungry, imo.
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They’ve got money sitting that they want to spend. Both in and out of gaming.
Klobrille said Microsoft isn’t buying sega
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Wanna link that? Just looked at his tweets and haven’t seen anything.
Edit; found it in the studios thread on XboxEra.
I don’t like that he winked at the of that. Really doesn’t make things clear at all. He’s been cheeky before. Lol
Care to link that here?
Klob backing up my general view that MS are not interested in big money acquisitions when it comes to Japan
I still think they’ll acquire more in Japan.
It’s a spot Phil has a big focus for and has said so publicly on multiple occasions.
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I just think they will prefer to expand Tango, and maybe even create thier own Japanese studio then spend billions on a publisher
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They don’t necessarily need to buy a publisher (although that’s a fast way to cover a lot of bases) but expanding Tango and buying up independent studios in Japan can go a long way.
The time to buy is now before tech company prices inflate even more.
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I half agree with you. They are not going to buy a japanese publisher, but I do see them buying independent studios.
Maybe Level 5, huge studio capable of hitting the ground running I suppose
Xbox doesn’t necessarily need japanese studios – it need IPs popular in Japan. Intelectual properties that are so big in Japan that would almost force them to get an Xbox / subscribe to Game Pass. Most of the times the studios don’t want to part ways with its IPs, though, hence the studio ends up in the deal aswell.
Persona and Yakuza are both big hits in Japan. Imagine acquiring Sega and making those franchises Game Pass exclusives?
Probably not gonna happen, though.
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What if this whole entire time Koei and SEGA were just a distraction while the real target is CAPCOM/Bandai Namco?
I kid. I kid.
Would not be surprised to see Scarlet Nexus be day one on Game Pass though.
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I don’t think xbox is interested in making another studio from scratch.
Xbox doesnt need to buy japanese studios to fix its issues it just has to get the ones that skip the platform on it and thats it (for now).
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Yeah, Satya made that pretty clear imo.
Like sure, if it’s a new studio about to release a game? Maybe. Not from the ground up though.
100%
Look at Initiative. Been running for years and we barely teased their game months ago and may not come out in the next 2 years if possible. Its too much investment for the turnout to be what it is.
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Plus, a japanese studio doesn’t really matter to appeal the japanese market per se. What would appeal is if the studio was headed by some big japanese creators.
One of them would be Shinji Mikami, who is already a Microsoft employee (!!).
Who else? Hideo Kojima and Yu Suzuki are the only ones who I could think of. Fumito Ueda would also be a huge get, especially with the downfall of Sony’s Japan Studio.
Edit: Maybe Koji Igarashi?
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You know how big it would be just to get a Kojima game on xbox (I dont care for his games personally)? Id do it just for the brand boost and media coverage xbox would get.
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Btw, it’s wild to think about all those industry giants that are now under the Xbox umbrella.
Shinji Mikami, Tim Schafer, Brian Fargo, Todd Howard, Tim Cain…
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