Man I hope they don’t mess up Bioshock, it is such a fantastic franchise. Assuming they do it well I agree it could become one of the biggest IP’s around.
Man the last thing I want is for them to go after one of the other major publishers.
Y’all are going crazy waiting for ABK to finish. Can you imagine how insufferable things would be if they grabbed T2 and/or EA next?
Smaller publishers and independent studios next… please…
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nah their are tons of FPS series which will not be owned by MS like bioshock, boarderlands, CS:GO, Destiny, multiple ubisoft ones ect. It is sort of impossible to have a monopoly in a genre of games though cos anyone can make a game but MS would own most of the popular big multiplayer ones
ehhh…I would add battlefield to that at least, I don’t see bioshock beating battlefield
IDK, I could see some studios but I think publishers are much more desirable because they have established IPs, tons of studios often with multiple teams, established fanbases and a much bigger proven track record. Being honest I don’t see small publishers either, I see the going for publishers which are mid sized (like bethesda for example) at smallest and with ABK anything is really on the table since we know those statements about being all in are not just PR fluff now
For me, a Japanese publisher and independent studios is what i’d like next. I don’t think they will go for another major Western publisher until other buyers start to bid and buy on that level as well.
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I don’t get this logic tbh, why would MS wait for competitors to grab who they want. All it would do it lead to MS missing out on potential companies they want and potentially even paying more than they otherwise would of because of bidding wars or just missing out on someone they wanted cos they were outbidded.
See, in terms of scale I’d consider Bethesda small when you’re comparing them to ABK/EA/T2.
Then the problem becomes I feel like Bandai Namco is the only “mid-sized” publisher.
I just remember people whining and complaining the ABK deal when Square West got bought out and I’m sure something similar would happen again if MS went for another titanic publisher deal.
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Realistically, who could and would buy EA or T2?
If another third party merged with them, nothing is lost. Amazon is still iffy when it comes to gaming, Apple is more focused on mobile, and Google noped out after Zenimax.
Tencent is probably the closest possibility we have when it comes to an actual gaming company. NetEase to a lesser extent.
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I considering bethesda as a mid level publisher while EA, T2, ABK, MS, Sony, Nintendo, Tencent and Netease I would consider all the big current players in this industry.
yeah but in the wider scheme of things MS won’t get everyone and if they were buying a mid level publisher like SEGA, Capcom or Ubisoft there is no gaurentee they would of went for SE west. I think MS missed out on the oppinunity but ABK is infinitely bigger and leads to infinitely more possibilities for MS on the business and gaming end
Amazon, Google, Apple, Meta/Facebook (don’t forget they tried to get ABK), Tencent, hell maybe disney, comcast (remember they almost acquired or merged with EA, I don’t remember the exact details) ect.
I feel like you just disregard a big portion of my comment here.
Again, Google noped out after Zenimax.
Apple seems way more focused on mobile.
Amazon is still iffy in gaming. Not sure they’d want to make a lot of big franchises exclusive right away.
All these random companies (like Discovery, Comcast, etc.) Microsoft wouldn’t really lose anything (probably).
I’m not too worried about Meta, they seem more focused on VR and the FTC seems to love to rain on their parade every time they breath.
I feel like a lot of people just want to see more giant crazy banners with Xbox’s name on them, and not actually thinking about how other companies may take advantage of that period while “the giant is sleeping”.
Why people think that there can be a monopoly on genre?
yeah but they could alway re enter, same logic as the threat of MS planning to keep CoD multiplat but the threat of exclusivity always being there (also they are still involved with gaming, stadia is still running and the play store is ran by them).
once again the possibility of expanding is there but their are also the rumours of them making a console. Sure these are just rumours but I wouldn’t write them off
maybe they won’t be exclusive right now (it is iffy) but MS is looking a decade or 2 into the future not the present where those games will be exclusive to luna and Amazon could buy a few publishers bundle them with prime and boost the price by $30 a year or something like that
the possibility is there though, escpecially if we look at the streaming acpect where they might make their subscription service on a higher tier and also keep in mind the metaverse which seems to be a big focus for these companies when it comes to their evolultion
once again though, they tried to buy ABK so them being focused on VR isn’t much of an argument considering ABK wasn’t that deep into VR at all (I don’t think they even had VR games) granted the FTC point is much more valid, I will give you that but to even try (And fail) to bring up concerns there they had to get extremely specific which would be harder to do with a gaming company like these (the only one I could see them linking to anti trust is ROBOX cos they could argue its a form a social media…its dumb but they could
can you elaborate cos I don’t understand what you mean here. Also I would take multiple mid sized publishers over EA or T2 so that that as you will
If they get the games from smaller entities, securing bigger fish is more important. I am more interested why Bungie deal flew under the radar. Guess nobody cared? Take 2 + Zynga also did not collect headlines much. ABK overshadowed everything.
Simply it feels like a lot of people online just want these major publishers for lists wars/salt mining.
Total domination is not something I want from any company, especially one of the first parties.
And for my own mental health, the less acquisition apocalypse whining I see online, the better. People literally tweeted at the POTUS about the ABK deal because they’re weirdos, but it gets less weird each major purchase Xbox/Microsoft makes in the gaming scene.
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Yeah the fanboys can get annoying on both ends (like people who pretend these acquisitions are just good or just bad are incredibly 1 sighted, their are positives and negatives. It isn’t just black or white). I also agree, I don’t want just 1 company ruling an industry, it can easily lead to anti competitive moves that affect an industry which can just become normalized but I highly doubt that will happen, I think other big techs will inevitably enter. That being said monopolies aren’t always bad, a lot of people will stand by centrilized health care for example and having multiple companies in stuff like powerlines could also be bad
yeah its weird cos its new. We haven’t seen acquisitions like this before or at this rate before in gaming but in reality it is just the same thing that happened to the movie industry few years ago with mass consolidation
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In the gaming space there is no total domination because Nintendo literally exists without any content from those big publishers…And we have a huge chunk of people who play on mobile and PC and don’t care about a lot of content provided by these publishers (as they are mainly into Tencent’s offerings for example)
not just that but then you have the indies, PC scene, Mobile scene ect. Even if MS swollowed the entire console market revenue which probably wouldn’t happen MS would only own about 28% of total gaming revenue with Mobile making 52% of revenue and PC making 20% of gaming revenue but I get what he is saying. He means he doesn’t want 1 company being too powerful in an industry since it can allow them to do anti consumer moves and odds are people will stick by said company if it be due to lack of options, lack of well known options or loyality and it will result in other companies following the anti consumer move until boom its normalized (granted this can happen even if they aren’t the market leader, look at MS with paid online which expanded to PS and later the switch)
Unless Nintendo is next… 
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I don’t mean literal total domination. Come on.
I could honestly see MS approaching Nintendo again. That doesn’t mean they will sell but I could see MS trying again. I low key want to see the internets reaction if it did happen, its the only thing that I think would realistically top ABK
Not to forget how Apple and Google are huge gaming platforms without even making or owning their own games
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