What if groups like Embracer and Tencent are just investing in stocks and buying random AA studios because THEY KNOW at some point they could sell at 30/40% more to the 3-4 BIG players that will own the videogame industry in 5+ years? It is a short term investment in my opinion
Tencent IDK but I think that Embracer is trying to make a subscription service in the future.
Watching the MS Surface event, Panos on stage talking about what experiences the devices are built for. The fact that he chose to name 365, Edge, Teams and Game Pass in particular says it all.
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If anyone’s interested in seeing why I continue to mention Tequila Works as a good acquisition target, here’s a short video they posted several months ago:
Hopefully you’ll see that they have a pretty impressive variety in their portfolio, and considering they’ve worked on 7 games in 10 years, a seemingly consistent development pipeline. Similar to how other recent pickups of Microsoft have been able to expand and grow with more resources, this team feels like a great fit to me…and they have history together, as Microsoft published their first game!
I know they’re not as “exciting” as Take Two or Ubisoft or others, but that doesn’t mean they’re not worth looking at.
edit - I’m aware they published some of these, but I think that plays to their strengths even more, as it shows they have a discerning eye
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Didn’t hear about that. Very interesting.
Just wish their Stadia exclusive Gylt would come to other platforms 
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I don’t think Embracer is growing because it wants to sell. The CEO started his business with Comics in the 90’s, to me it seems like a kind of passion project. Saw some good opportunities and kept the momentum going.
Always amazes me that Sega get’s mentioned by someone even in off topic posts lmfao
The biggest Heel turn since Stone Cold Steve Austin shook hands with Mr McMahon at Wrestlemania 17 will be if by some miracle Sony are the ones to get Sega lmfao.
If that ever happens in a different reality we should call this thread “Phil Spencer Memes and Broken Dreams”
With the Nvidia leak, Oxide Games could be a sleeper acquisition in the future, they check a lot of boxes
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Working with Xbox on a new project codenamed Indus (Strategy 4X game)
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The studio is located in Lutherville Timonium, Maryland, only 1 hour away from Bethesda HQ
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Small studio with around 60 employees
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The studio owns a custom game engine, Nitrous, that is widely recognized as best-in-class in the next generation of game engines. ( copy and pasted from Linkedin )
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WC said in a article they wouldn’t be surprised if Project Indus is heavily designed with cloud platforms and smaller screens in mind too, using Microsoft’s cloud-aware user interface APIs.
It’s not a fancy pickup compared to the publisher talk but this studio makes sense.
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In the gaming space The Witcher is absolutely now bigger then Batman. When CDPR reveal the next game, the hype levels will be huge.
Anyeay think of Zenimax as the big publisher acquisition, whoever’s comes next will likely offer something that’s different.
MS will still buy devs tho, independent etc
It’s launching on smart tvs this year…and 70 million Xbox Ones
By my calculations, if Microsoft can average just 4 million streaming customers a year, for the next 7 years, Xbox will take first place this generation.
Realistically, its likely to be a lot more then that.
Were they hiding the stocks in a drawer, under the bed or down the back of the sofa? 
They need to earn money. That only comes in through subs, just being there on devices means really little without monetization.
What on Earth are you talking about? Microsoft does what is great for Microsoft and just because they bought things like Nuance and wanted Tik Tok or Discord does not mean that everything under the sun is up for purchase, in fact, sometimes things change.
The Bethesda deal happened because owners at Zenimax wanted to realize gains and Bethesda the publisher and all studios that came under it were being shopped for quite some time. This is a publisher that had The Elder Scrolls, Fallout, DOOM all as desirable properties, tech and it took time.
What do you think will happen when Microsoft wants to make another big move? You think it will happen overnight? No, Phil Spencer and the team will have to convince the CEO and CFO why such a move would make sense, how it makes the gaming business better, and how many people are being absorbed. How those jobs are going to make the brand more desirable long term, and how are they going to make money.
In this regard, talk has been that Microsoft should buy Square Enix, and the reasoning behind it is that it can be leveraged to get Game Pass on Sony consoles.
Just because someone does not buy into the overly rosy predictions some paint in here does not mean that we do not care about the Xbox brand nor do we want to see it succeed. Huge deals do not grow on trees and there is a reason why only two publisher deals have happened when it comes to console manufacturers. They are not easy, and that is the reality.
As we have seen in the previous year or so, people have been speculating who is coming in next, whether it be WB, two more studios or even Take2, and eventually to the likes of Square Enix. None has happened. I hope that Game Pass continues to expand, and there are people who know I have argued elsewhere that any acquisitions only make sense if games are exclusive to Game Pass. So I do not get where the bad faith argument comes from. It is normal for people to disagree even on some of the most rosy expectations.
I simply do not buy that Game Pass is going to be on Sony systems, or that Square Enix will be bought with the express reason of getting into that ecosystem via leverage.
It would surprise you that you need to convince business leaders on why they should spend money on your division and not others. Phil Spencer wanted the Mojang deal done sooner. Reading some articles during the Mattrick era, and the lack of investment, it is clear that some in gaming wanted more investment. Similarly, there was an interview where Phil Spencer said that there was a meeting where Nadella told him that there could be a future where Xbox was not part of Microsoft. To that, Spencer called back and said that if they were going to be in gaming, they needed to be all in.
So, yeah, they need to convince people that make decisions why spending huge cash reserves on gaming is better than spending it elsewhere. This is how all businesses work.
My point stands, it’s not about “rosy optimism” but more about paying attention to what Satya Nadella has said ad nauseam… or the fact that at the Surface event today, there wasn’t an announcement that went without a mention of Xbox and Game Pass… at a Surface event. All of us here are well aware of the Satya/Phil conversation, but that was in 2014… before the Scorpio and 15 studio acquisitions, xCloud, etc.
So yeah, your points ring of being intentionally obtuse… or at least nearly eight years out of date.
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Way to ignore newer events that don’t fit your narrative and focus on the old events.
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I honestly have to wonder just how that conversation went
Satya : Phil, take a seat, we have to discuss Xbox. Y’know there may be a point where Xbox isn’t part of Microsoft.
Phil: Well I think if Xbox remains at Microsoft, it would be better business done above the table instead of under the table.
Satya: OK, i’m convinced. Here’s $2.5B for that studio you wanted.
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I am still here mate, and I do not buy most of what I read. When everyone was talking about more acquisitions, I stopped and wondered whether they made sense so soon after the agreement to get Bethesda, and before the deal closed. At E3, I hoped that there might be expansion, but it did not happen and it is not the end of the world.
There will be acquisitions, but it will not surprise me if they are individual developers and not another significant publisher not potentially named WB. I say WB because Discovery may not be big on gaming.
Same thing with subscriptions. I do not have this overly rosy picture about how fast Game Pass will grow, and that it being on more devices means huge growth in subscriptions. God willing, we will see how it turns out.
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God damn 200+ posts last time I was here