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After looking it up, got to say do you all think Project Moon, creators of Library of Ruina and the mobile game Limbo Company, as a possible acquisition target for Xbox? I think its a high possibility considering that Library of Ruina is only available on Windows and Xbox.
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0 ? Thunderful and 11 bit studios were among the 17 studios considered by Microsoft lol
I really like Thunderful, I think it would be a very good acquisition for Xbox. Agostino Simonetta worked at Xbox ID and I would like to see more creative studios like this at Xbox. 11 bit studios and Don’t Nod would also be very good choices for original AA games.
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Every time the media shows its bias, the thoughts I have about studios vs publisher acquisitions lean more in favor of publishers.
Honestly wouldnt be opposed at all to acquiring both Sega and Square enix.
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What about DLALA studios. I think they did a fine work on Battletoads. They could form a nice duo with Double Fine.
I agree with you 100%, I want a mix from Microsoft when it comes to the next acquisition meaning individual studios and publisher, I do feel like Microsoft is dropping the ball when it comes to individual studios purchased that would exclusive to Gamepass.
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It does feel like the ‘obvious’ list of studio acquisitions just keeps getting longer.
- Crystal Dynamics (working on Perfect Dark and previously had the Tomb Raider exclusivity deal).
- Eidos Montréal (working on Fable and allegedly a second project)
- People Can Fly (working on a new Xbox exclusive and previously made a Gears game).
- IOI (working on Project Dragon and has had a number of GP deals).
- Remedy (had a number of Xbox exclusives Inc Alan Wake 1 and Quantum Break).
- Certain Affinity (has worked on Halo and COD for years and a new Monster Hunter type exclusive).
- Asobo (working on Flight Simulator and has also undertaken a number of Xbox exclusives).
- Crytek (Ryse was a fantastic Xbox exclusive and their Cry engine could flourish under Xbox).
- Stoic Studios (Towerborne exclusive).
- Oxide Games (Ara exclusive).
- Avalanche Games (RAGE and Contraband exclusives).
- Iron Galaxy (Killer Instinct, Spyro and Crash Bandicoot).
- CDPR (Witcher 2 was exclusive to Xbox and Xbox has the Cyberpunk marketing) .
This is just a few I can think off the top of my head.
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Adding to this:
Cococucumber (Echo Generations and RavenLock)
Project Moon (Library of Ruina, that is exclusive to xbox and windows still and was a GP Deal, with Limbus Company being a mobile game adds to Xbox mobile gaming advances)
Studio MDHR (Cuphead)
Interior Night (As Dusk Falls, an Xbox Exclusive)
Pearl Abyss (Black Desert was part of Game Pass for a long while)
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Good shout, especially MDHR.
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With embracer, i can see Microsoft buying a good chunk out of them
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I don’t think they’re dropping the ball at all. Getting the big ones out of the way first was I think best before going for smaller ones. I also think they will leave the buying of the smaller studios to the publishers under them. I’m thinking most of these other studios that we name will fall under Xbox Games Studio Publishing.
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Somehow, I don’t see Microsoft buying that many independent studios. I can see them going for Crystal and Eidos as they can merge them with the initiative and Playground. Certain Affinity can go under 343. The rest they may just continue to partner with unless their publishers want more but it seems they’re more about expanding their studios.
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I think Microsoft should really go after Owlcat Games.
After playing both Pathfinders, i see huge potential in the studio. The games are not perfect, mainly because of budget, but I enjoyed them even more than Baldur’s Gate 3. With proper funding, I can see Owlcat making a crpg even more incredible than BG3.
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The problem with partnering is that it’s also very unreliable, not just quality but for scheduling your roadmap (there’s also reliability cough Scalebound cough).
Killer Instinct was the perfect example where Amazon swooped in and and acquired Double Helix. Had Xbox acquired Double Helix we may still be getting regular updates and new entries to this franchise. Although KI is meant to be coming back it pretty much killed the fighting genre on Xbox especially after PS also made Street Fighter exclusive!
If Asobo get gobbled up then Xbox will likely be screwed trying to find a new partner for Flight Simulator too (and will the new partner be anywhere near the same quality as Asobo?).
Assuming Ara is a hit for Xbox then they could be equally screwed if Oxide gets acquired… The list goes on.
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I can see them going for a few big independent ones like you said, CD, Eidos, IOI etc
The ones they are already working with, it would be a bit of a disaster to be working with CD on PD only for them to be bought out by someone else so a possible sequel is in limbo, they can’t have a KI situation happen again
I don’t really see them going after smaller indie devs, I can see those being kept to Game Pass deals as usual
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I hoping for Support Studios. They do have enough mainstream studios at this point. Any Publishers will be a long way out since it will raise alarms ,
But I wondering. Why everyone want a Trillion dollar corporation to buy up more companies up when it really does not help us at all but in long run hurt us. (I was for the ABK deal)
I forgot to include Harebrained Schemes as well since this is one studio i think Xbox may try to get their hands on in the future.
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For me personally it’s not necessarily supporting a trillion dollar company buying up everything, but to either aid competition or continue with their current output (which technically should also aid competition).
For example if PS acquire Crystal Dynamics, Eidos Montréal, IOI and Remedy (technically Asobo too) it would mean Sony practically own every single studio which makes those big third person cinematic adventure games. As Xbox already lack in this area considerably it would seriously harm them ever competing with PS in this genre. By acquiring these partners now there is guaranteed competition between the two (which will also hopefully help lead to better games).
As I touched on above if anyone swoops in and acquires any of the third party studios they are currently working with it will seriously harm all the hard work they have done to repair their image. For example I have no idea who would take over Flight Simulator if Asobo was snapped up and it’s one of Xbox’s highest scoring games on Metacritic.
Like I said above when Amazon brought the Killer Instinct devs it really screwed Xbox over, which PS doubled down on by getting exclusivity on Street Fighter.
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Hasn’t hurt me yet, obviously we will see what happens in the long run but I’m not gonna worry about that as it’s beyond anyone’s control
Besides, if these companies are selling then somebody is going to buy them regardless, acquisitions are inevitable and thanks to GP, id rather they buy them than others quite frankly
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I can absolutely appreciate the apprehension, but I will say this, in regards to Xbox acquisitions specifically (which, given the focused title, I think makes sense to focus solely on this particular purchaser):
Xbox acquisitions are unique because Xbox, as a platform-holder and publisher, is unique; Bethesda’s acquisition did not see any layoffs upon completion of the acquisition, despite the media running with that FUD scheme (I’m well aware there have been layoffs since, that does not negate this point), and by all accounts from staff members I talk to - their lives have gotten better following Xbox pickups (better benefits, better pay, promotion and cross training opportunities, and I can literally go on).
For gamers, it’s pretty obvious that we are seeing benefits, in the short and long-term: Game Pass gives a lot of people the ability to play a hell of a lot more games than we could normally afford, and given that First-Party titles are Day One releases on GP…. Do we really need to illustrate how that’s beneficial? Furthermore, more studios offer a greater diversity on GP, more gamers get to play those games means we get more experimental titles that aren’t just AAA cookie-cutter (think Pentiment).
That’s a quick list of why many of us want more dev pickups; Xbox acquisitions have not fallen to the trend we see at Sony (closures and mass layoffs shortly after acquiring) or Embracer, so it’s easy to see why most of us are for it. If there are worrying signs down the line, that’s one thing but to just blanket-state that it’s harmful for gamers/devs is missing the forest for the trees in this case.
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