Yeah, after ABK we can safely say that price does not matter. Anecdotally they earn more by the time deal closed.
Its missing South Korean gaming companies which are big.
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Its not when you consider their lack of in house development capacity. They are dirt cheap for a reason lol.
True, if would probably be worth adding some of the bigger ones:
- NCSoft
- Nexon
- Pearl Abyss
- NetMarble
- Smilegate
- Krafton (Bluehole)
Gravity and GameEvil Com2Us as well potentially.
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Fair point, they do have a number of smaller dev teams, the must notable being DotEmu (Streets of Rage & TMNT) and Deck13 (The Surge).
It’s the outsourcing they do best right now such as A Plague Tale with Asobo (Focus own the IP). Evil West also looks like it will be awesome IMO.
I do think they are the publisher to look out for.
Most of them are purely MMO developers though.
Why is this a problem?
Krafton developed PUBG.
Smilegate developed Crossfire.
Nexon developed Dragon Fighter which is a hack and slash and Crazyracing which is a Kart Racer. Maple Story and Dragon Quest are also huge (way bigger than WoW for example).
Yeah but if MS didnt take the chance to the chance to get bungie which owns the 3rd biggest FPS and 2nd biggest MMO I doubt they would want to pay 2.5B for CDPR…also I believe its just the game rights they own so the movie stuff wouldn’t matter (I am not certain though so if I am mistaken please correct me)
I doubt they would sell it unless their was a big mark up, that is the issue. Going off what has been said in the rumours, it seems like they want to license out the IP not sell the game rights
I will be honest, I think people are really over estemating how much screwtency ABK is receiving. I think if ABK proves anything, it proves that price isn’t a valid argument anymore
Microsoft did not want Bungie to continue to make multiplatform games, while Bungie wanted to do that. Simple as that. Microsoft showed time and time again that they want exclusive content and not multiplatform releases.
If WB want to sell their internal studios, they will have to offer exclusive rights to some DC IPs. Otherwise, it would be just buying people.
I agree. Process of ABK acquisition is not different from anything before with the exception of unions.
no, they have literally confirmed they want game pass on PS and Switch. Its fairly obviously that is what their focus is on and exclusivity is just a means to try and force their hands Xbox has ruled out Game Pass on other consoles in near future | VGC. “We have no plans to bring it to any other kind of closed platforms right now, mainly because those closed platforms don’t want something like Game Pass,”
I could see an exclusive licensing agreement far a set amount of years but thats the best I can see, I could be wrong but that is just my honest opinion
Microsoft is still hiring tons of people. They are laying off people who’s positions are no longer needed as they did a realignment. Every year, the new fiscal year starts for Microsoft and shortly after the 4th of July they will do a realignment like this. It’s happened for years and years.
I wouldn’t read into this and definitely don’t think this has any bearing on if they would or wouldn’t take on 20,000 staff as part of a acquisitions.
Considering the amount of debt WB have, I wonder if they would be willing to sell gaming DC licenses for a higher price to off load part of the debt.
Microsoft wants the exclusive content to the platform and they avoid releasing multiplatform games (aside GaaS support for the existing titles). They don’t want “pay 70$ on other platform but we have Game Pass” scenario.
When they talk about Game Pass on PS and Switch, they mean the same thing as they do everywhere - xCloud. Their whole Open App Store crusade is about that basically.
3rd biggest FPS and 2nd biggest MMO?
Just off the top of my head I can think of loads of FPS franchises which are bigger than Destiny and with MMO it doesn’t even come close. Counter Strike, COD, Crossfire, Apex Legends and PUBG are all bigger than Destiny for example.
They didn’t get Bungie because they wanted to remain independent and also retain control of publishing. It wouldn’t have worked for Xbox because if for example they wanted Destiny on GP and Bungie said no they couldn’t do anything about it.
For 2.5 billion not only will they get one of the biggest RPG studios with a successful media offshoot but a whole PC storefront in GOG.com, it’s not as big as Epic Game Store but it’s definitely still very valuable.
I think anything is possible, WB games wouldn’t be that expensive in the big scheme of things, especially as they are trying to get their debt under control.
Hell, MS could easily afford to buy the whole of WBD.
Debt is not going anywhere. If they cost 30b, then with debt of 60b they are gonna be 90b at least. Unless the company that acquires them wants to add debt to its balance (Microsoft has around 60b in debt)
I was talking about acquiring gaming IP rights from WB games (with the game studios), they (WBD) would more likely make a deal due to the parent company’s debt (which they will want to clear).
If you look back at Marvel the reason they sold off all their movie rights was due to debt and the potential risk of bankruptcy.
That’s what was I advocating for quite some time - Microsoft either grabs NRS (with MK IP obviousl) and also may try to get the exclusive DC rights in case of them buying other WB studios. Or maybe like Spider-man maneuver where they split DC property in gaming and everything else. I do wonder what is the price of DC IPs at this point.
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I completely agree Hue, when putting this together 3 things jumped out at me how low focus is valued , they would be a very inexpensive value add. If focus Home is worth 270 million what is platinum’s worth? They probably could purchase them and not even have regulators involved. Lastly valuations have dropped significantly from last year, it’s definitely a buyer’s market right now.
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Platinum is around 30m at best.
Microsoft does not acquire stuff just because it is cheap.
Where did you get that number? And I never said Microsoft should acquire because they were cheap.
as I said, I could be wrong, but I don’t see it happening
is that why xcloud is on PC and not game pass. They have literally said they went to bring the whole experience over not a stripped down verision hence they haven’t done it yet. MS has made it extremely clear their goal is to become the netflix of games hence they want it everywhere
I am going off what I read in the interviewa but I know CoD and CS:GO are bigger
I am going to sat this, they would almost definitely kill GOG, the ABK launcher is also going to die most likely so they are spending 2.5 Billion on a single big WRPG franchise and a publisher which last game was one of the biggest disaters in gaming…for referece that is the same amount they paid for Minecraft which had the potential to become one of the biggest games in the world and did become the best selling game in the world with a lot of room to expand though spin offs…Yeah I don’t think CDPR is a good buy in the slightest but we can agree to disagree
yeah anything is possible but I just don’t think its likely and in terms of WBD the question becomes does MS even want to enter the movie industry (this might not be a popular opinion but if they are I think paramount is the more likely movie cheaper and is a company they are working with)