I’ll be honest I never was the biggest fan of Ubisoft, because they don’t bring that many games out, yet they have a huge workforce, but if MS was to scale down games like Assassins Creed without all the added filler, which I’ve heard many people don’t want, MS could use those employees on other Ubisoft games.
Maybe bring back Price of Persia or Splinter Cell or use all those employees to help other Xbox first party games too.
So Ubisoft would definitely help with game development and open the doors to other parts of the world MS has said they want to be in too.
I think the main consensus with Ubisoft is yeah, they’ve got too many staff but that’s not necessarily a disadvantage. Like you say - if they scale back the likes of AC or Far Cry (which wouldn’t even be a bad thing to do) they could reasonably free up some staff for other work. Additional games per your suggestion, or perhaps acting as a support team network across Xbox studios.
Personally I’d rather see them aim for diversity of content at this point, but there’s definitely an advantage to Ubisoft.
TBH they have quite a few issues but I don’t think output is one of them.
2019
FarCry New Dawn
Trials Rising
The Division 2
Ghost Recon Breakpoint
Just Dance 2020
3 Mobile Games
15+ Ports/VR/Re-Releases
2020
Watch Dogs Legion
Assassin’s Creed Valhalla
Just Dance 2021
Immortals Fenyx Rising
5 Mobile Games
10+ Ports/VR/Re-Releases
2021
Scott Pilgrim
Far Cry 6
Riders Republic
Just Dance 2022
Monopoly Madness
1 Mobile Game
1 Port
(Rainbow Six Extraction was also due but delayed to January 22).
There isn’t another publisher anywhere near their price point with the same level of output, this was also over the Covid period so most of their content has been delayed.
Ubisoft or embracer have a lot of output, but alternatively if they did go for either you would hear a lot of arguments like it is damaging competition and taking away games. Not saying it couldn’t happen but if ABK goes through i feel if you add one of those two there would probably be a consent decree to keep existing franchises Multi-Platform
They do, however I would add that Embracers output is mostly AA and their market cap is double.
It’s only really Gearbox and now Crystal/Eidos which currently offer AAA games.
Personally I don’t think Xbox would care if future acquisitions were multi-platform. In many respects I also wouldn’t care if it’s on GamePass as that’s what I care about more .
I think Xbox is going to be in a strong position to offer more than enough exclusives once the Activision deal closes, even if Call of Duty remains multi-platform for the foreseeable future.
If regulatory pressure restricts them into keeping future acquisitions multi-platform (or more likely it’s just easier to get through the regulatory process by announcing their intent to keep titles multiplatform outright) OR ideal acquisition partners are looking for a “Bungie deal” that allows them to remain multi-platform I personally think that’s fine.
I see several goals for the growth of the GP and several ways to achieve them:
Microsoft must maintain the good growth of GP on PC (SEGA).
Microsoft must bring new community (PS, Nintendo, and mobile) on its ecosystem to increase the number of people who can subscribe to the GP (Ubisoft or Capcom).
Microsoft should provide regular FP game content to keep users/subscribers interested (Ubisoft, SEGA, and maybe Capcom).
Of course, you can achieve these objectives with other editors, but these seem to me the most relevant, in addition to being among the cheapest on the market. Indie studio acquisitions often come without a major IP and need time to show off their first games. These are good acquisitions, but I doubt that it will increase the number of subscribers or Xbox owners. That’s why, from my perspective, publisher acquisitions should be Microsoft’s priority. This is what will allow it to take market share.
SUMO does not have a big IP and often makes bad games. SUMO carried out the catastrophic 360 port of FH2 for Microsoft and supported the development of Crackdown 3. Suffice to say that it is far from being a success and it has done worse with other publishers.
Ubisoft is one of the cheapest publishers on the market and even if its catalog is very interesting, it does not have a super license like COD, FIFA, GTA, or Fortnite. It would be legally very difficult to prove that this takeover harms competition or that Ubisoft produces unique games, especially when the cited rival produces exactly this type of game with better results.
I don’t think it’s enough when you take more than 5 years to develop a game. It’s the exclusives that bring players to the console and make them potential subscribers. ABK will not bring that much exclusivity, and especially not in the short term.
I don’t believe Microsoft will offer Mojang level freedom to any japanese publisher.
And that’s why I am saying Capcom is prime candidate - 50% of their revenue is coming from PC anyway which is Microsofft’s domain. Square Enix could be interesting - as FF14 is adapted to consoles thus could work even via cloud (like Fortnite) + all their junk they produce doesn’t sell a lot on PS4/Switch/PC anyway thus is good for Game Pass. Playstation is not important and relevant market in Japan anyway and a lot of games from our favourite publishers like Sega or Capcom are not available on Switch anyway.
I’m not so sure. I could totally see a scenario where a Japanese publisher is bought and the major titles are kept multi-platform, while dormant IP returning or even new IP potentially being exclusive.
If it makes the deal go through with little to no resistance, helps improve Game Pass numbers, and gives Microsoft access to a hub they didn’t have much of a presence at before I don’t really see much of an issue.
Of course I’m not privy of what the head honchos at Microsoft would think of the deal, but I don’t see that set of circumstances being a deal breaker.
RE? RE is coming soon and the next RE will come like when? In 4-5 years? Can be made exclusive by that time.
SF6? SF6 will be supported like Gaas as it is basically a sole Capcom fighing game for this whole gen. The next SF is not coming until the next gen at least and thus can be made exclusive. Not the first time for the game
Dragon’s Dogma has no announced platforms and thus it can go either exclusive or multiplat and the next game is not coming for years too. Won’t be much outcry if it were to become exclusive either.
DMC? IP is in limbo as we have no idea when the game is coming.
Monster Hunter? Will be treated like COD or Minecraft as it is a big IP with some crossmedia value. Not to mention it is also coming on mobile like other big IPs like that.
Smaller games? Game Pass + released everywhere like Quake Remaster
Resistence from whom? Sony again? Sony will complain anyway (probably will bring some stupid argument like “this IP originated on Playstation”). Nintendo won’t care anyway. And other publishers too.
But still it would have been great to continue having their support on AAA xbox games, after all they eorked on forza horizon and the new fable, also not everything is chaos, sonic racing trilogy, snake pass, sackboy big adventure are great games, not masterpieces but they have their quality and xbox could use more family friendoy games for gamepass, still I respect your opinion, I was mad at them after crackdown 3 but remember that the game passed through several developers
Even without them, ubisoft games are always in the most play lists on xbox so they will be beneficial, you dont even need to make most of their games exclusive, I dont believe that somelne will invest on a xbox just to play monopoly, but having the game on gamepass aswell getting the revenue from ps and nintendo would be great
Not really, I have commented before that the only reason why my country loves playstation is because they have the marketing for games such as cod or fifa, and most of the casuals believes that those games are ps exclusive, I barely see someone here playing god of war or horizon
Now with xbox having the marketing for cod aswell putting it in gamepass day one we will see a huge change
Square wil be perfect with a deal like this, sadly they arent selling the entire thing, ms really needs to invest in yoko taro and nier team
I am not sure if it was posted already but thid is interesting, like some people have said capcom is doing extremely well so I dont expect a change r acquisition from them for a long time(but who knows)
It will sound wild but what if microsoft decides to invest in square? Especially the final fantasy 14 team, afterall they invested in that korean developer, and it wasnt with xbox, who knows, just an interesting though that I had seeing this
I saw that tweet. There really isn’t anything new in it though. It talks about Sega’s “Super Game” initiative, Konami publishing 3 new Silent Hill games (it’s a stretch to call this one a “huge pivot” IMO, they’re all outsourced even), and the recent comments from Square.
Not sure, I guess it depends on what “investing into Square” means. If it means buying stock in the company, then no, I don’t think MS does that. As for the “courting outside investors for its development teams” part in the article, well, even the article states it’s not quite clear what that means yet. I don’t think MS likes funding IPs they don’t own anymore and I’m not sure what this approach means for Game Pass releases which is MS’s most important goal.
I don’t really know what will happen with FF14, I’d almost say MS needs it more than the game needs MS, it’s so crazy successful that it offsets all the blunders Square keeps doing. IMO though MS/Phil really should just move heaven and earth to get this game onto Xbox, just because Phil promised it a few years ago already. He was getting questioned about it in Japanese interviews this year and it sounded like he was unsure himself at this point.
There might be some exclusives and I certainly don’t expect MS to let a company like Capcom/Sega or whoever have the freedom Mojang do but if/when they do invest heavily in Japan, im not suddenly expecting most things to go exclusive
They probably could with how strong companies like Capcom and Sega are on PC now and I only expect that to improve but I kinda see them banking on GP as the appeal for those titles but still supporting the other systems
Im fine with either though, being able to get the libraries of Sega or Capcom, past, present and future on GP would be a huge W
I guarantee they are interested in Square
I can see people thinking no because of what appears to be a not-so-great relationship right now but all that really matters to these companies is money and if MS feel Square would benefit their business they will go after them
They have a big library for GP, offer genres and games Xbox don’t have and appeal worldwide
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