Xbox Acquisition |OT4| It's Acquisition Season for Xbox with $69 Billion deal, NICE!

[Paxton]

@Sydle

I’m not sure about Bungie’s situation. Technically, it’s still possible for MS to separate with a studio even if they were previously integrated, but I imagine there are more headaches to unwind it all.

IIRC, any company that was bought is marked under the “limited” company category as a subsidiary for law regards, only those who were founded by the parent company doesn’t have it as they are declared as divisions. Rare is a subsidiary as it was bought, Turn10 and The Initiative are divisions as they were founded by MS. Bungie was always a subsidiary and therefore, a split was easier.

[IdiotGuru (Justin)]

@JonnJonzz

I’m not sure if MS would want to buy the studio Far From Home, but their new game, Forever Skies looks interesting.

It might be a smart move to get in good with this Polish game company and see where they go from there.

Fallout/Metro meets the Jetsons, I guess? Interesting but I’m not sure this is the kind of game Xbox needs another one of in it’s portfolio. I tend to think People Can Fly makes the most sense out of Poland right now.

[Knottian (Daniel)]

@Sydle

… assimilate studios and have them adopt all things Microsoft as far as people and asset management go (e.g. standardizing and leveling roles, adopting MS performance review and management process, getting a Microsoft email, etc.). I think it was someone from Rare or one of the other studios that commented how much work that was and how it effectively changes a culture. By contrast, the new studios get to retain their culture and way of doing things to a greater extent. My earlier comment about being acquired as a subsidiary, even with easier ways to separate if necessary, was an example of how differently MS approaches things these days and really aims to let the studios be themselves and focus on their craft, without all of the rigor and change that comes with proper folding into Microsoft.

This entire line of reasoning is incorrect; they are all wholly-owned subsidiaries, which has no distinction functionally from “internally-built” teams/divisions (I’m being slightly reductive here, there are differences, but not pertaining to these discussion points). You’re conflating “subsidiary” with “limited-integration”, the latter is the acquisition philosophy Microsoft has adopted to effectively take a laissez faire approach to the studios/companies they acquire; basically they do as little to alter their culture as possible, and offer creative freedom, etc. Basically they attempt to allow the way said studio/company has operated to go unaltered whilst providing all the benefits of being owned by Microsoft (finances, inter-team knowledge sharing, tools, etc.).

Btw, this acquisition & integration philosophy has been in place at Microsoft far longer than just two years; the purchase of Mojang was the first Microsoft acquisition to employ this philosophy. Again, I must reiterate, functionally these acquisitions are Microsoft and this isn’t some break-glass ploy to initiate a batched firesale should there need to be for some reason. Not sure where/why this originated.

[Cayde4Ever (Cayde)]

@BlessedbyHorus

Microsoft getting a studio in Poland would be a good idea. Poland has a lot of good talent imo. I like that Microsoft has a lot of European studios now.

Yeah. A company that I would like to see them work with is The Astronauts

[beastmode10]

@Sydle

… assimilate studios and have them adopt all things Microsoft as far as people and asset management go (e.g. standardizing and leveling roles, adopting MS performance review and management process, getting a Microsoft email, etc.). I think it was someone from Rare or one of the other studios that commented how much work that was and how it effectively changes a culture. By contrast, the new studios get to retain their culture and way of doing things to a greater extent. My earlier comment about being acquired as a subsidiary, even with easier ways to separate if necessary, was an example of how differently MS approaches things these days and really aims to let the studios be themselves and focus on their craft, without all of the rigor and change that comes with proper folding into Microsoft.

assimilate studios and have them adopt all things Microsoft as far as people and asset management go (e.g. standardizing and leveling roles, adopting MS performance review and management process, getting a Microsoft email

Those things would be a part of any acquisition, usually. Not just studio acquisitions.

MS is choosing not to do this completely with studios. But they are doing it to a smaller extent with the tech acquisitions. They follow the same light touch integration with larger acquisitions across the board.

I sense a pejorative tone with what they have as a process for the tech industry. In which case you are not aware of MS at all. Their processes are some of the most industry leading processes. Whether they choose to apply this for studios is a decision that has been taken since the days of Mojamg and LinkedIn. They sense that their industry processes are not required in the arts heavy gaming industry which follows a movie industry type of structure to an extent, and has half the dept following a tech structure.

I’ll say it again - Don’t mistake light touch integration with easy separation possibility… And I think , even Knottian mentions it here. This is not about being acquired as a subsidiary. They started doing this with LinkedIn, GitHub, Mojamg after Ballmers model of acquisition was not completely successful with the choice of Nokia (who was playing bluff with MS).

A lot of those leaders were promoted instantly and started driving the culture at MS, i.e., a reverse culture change. Especially the GitHub and LinkedIn folks were driving it for quite some time.

[Knottian (Daniel)]

@beastmode10

…e the days of Mojamg and LinkedIn. They sense that their industry processes are not required in the arts heavy gaming industry which follows a movie industry type of structure to an extent, and has half the dept following a tech structure. I’ll say it again - Don’t mistake light touch integration with easy separation possibility… And I think , even Knottian mentions it here. This is not about being acquired as a subsidiary. They started doing this with LinkedIn, GitHub, Mojamg after Ballmers model of acquisition was not completely successful with the choice of Nokia (who was playing bluff with MS). A lot of those leaders were promoted instantly and started driving the culture at MS, i.e., a reverse culture change. Especially the GitHub and LinkedIn folks were driving it for quite some time.

[SchwiftyFella]

@PopMegaphone

I’m saying that Xbox needs/wants more than western core gamers. They are doing great in that market, now they need to expand beyond it. That mostly means east Asian and mobile. Xbox is super weak in those areas and they need to do something big to attract those markets. That’s how you get the numbers to work for these huge purchases. You need to attack completely new markets/demographics. Not the same old shit. The good news is buying something big for those markets will be nice for core western gamers as well.

I strongly disagree they should double down on consoles because the market isn’t big enough. We’re moving past console wars. It isn’t MS vs Sony anymore.

See I disagree they aren’t even doing great with Western gamers rn… Gamepass hasn’t even reached 30m yet out of probably around 200m western traditional gamers. That is very low market penetration. They have a long way to go. Right now, gamepass isn’t seen as a must have yet. It is seen as a great deal. They have plenty of work to do.

[Knottian (Daniel)]

Seeing so much Game Pass circular arguments across the forum has me poised to nip any Game Pass-exclusive talk in the bud. We have a specific GP thread to wax poetic about GP’s failings and successes 24/7. Unless there’s a “this dev acquisition would be great for GP in x area/genre”, comments are going to be removed.

[Weaam]

No new rumor/leak ?

[PopMegaphone]

@SchwiftyFella

See I disagree they aren’t even doing great with Western gamers rn… Gamepass hasn’t even reached 30m yet out of probably around 200m western traditional gamers. That is very low market penetration. They have a long way to go. Right now, gamepass isn’t seen as a must have yet. It is seen as a great deal. They have plenty of work to do.

Hardware is seriously supply constrained. That is going to bottleneck growth. They are basically selling every console they make.

The Xbox core western gaming experiences pipeline is super bright.

[Sydle]

@beastmode10

…e the days of Mojamg and LinkedIn. They sense that their industry processes are not required in the arts heavy gaming industry which follows a movie industry type of structure to an extent, and has half the dept following a tech structure. I’ll say it again - Don’t mistake light touch integration with easy separation possibility… And I think , even Knottian mentions it here. This is not about being acquired as a subsidiary. They started doing this with LinkedIn, GitHub, Mojamg after Ballmers model of acquisition was not completely successful with the choice of Nokia (who was playing bluff with MS). A lot of those leaders were promoted instantly and started driving the culture at MS, i.e., a reverse culture change. Especially the GitHub and LinkedIn folks were driving it for quite some time.

We are missing each other or you are intentionally twisting my words. I’m not even going to attempt to unwind it and I’m just bowing out of this discussion all together because I am exhausted from work.

Later.

[Deadwing88]

All Hitman games hitting gamepass, exclusive IP being developed…

IOI.

[Butters (Sven)]

I think that Xbox is becoming even more aggressive in the next few months, including in the acquisition space.

Sony is probably going to launch it’s “new” service with some big games in the first month’s and good promotions. And we know that PlayStation tries to negotiate for exclusive streaming/service rights to the games they offer. That’s the reason why some of the Zenimax games came late to GamePass. The content fight for GamePass is probably going to get harder.

I really don’t want to see some half assed attempt here from Microsoft.

[power]

[Daniel]

@power

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only a matter of time.

[javycane (Javier Ruiz)]

@Deadwing88

All Hitman games hitting gamepass, exclusive IP being developed…

IOI.

[Friday]

@power

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Dont do this to me . I dont want to be disappointed again .

[Deadwing88]

@javycane

All the chips are falling that it really doesn’t make sense for Microsoft not to acquire IOI.

[Proven]

Jez

[Roronoa_Zoro90]

It’s time to pull the trigger on some acquisitions imo, it could be another great distraction from light 1st party line-up, also they can be timed to be petty like Sony. XD