I understand this in general but how would it worsen the relations with ZeniMax/Bethesda since they would obviously own them? If anything, all the Bethesda studios should be thrilled. Get paid the same amount of money or more while eliminating one or two platforms that they have to work on.
I wouldn’t have them be multi-platform in regards to PlayStation at all. Just Xbox/PC and that’s it. But yeah, it is what it is.
This is getting ridiculous
It wouldn’t have been a simple refund to Sony, they would have had to pay whatever the exit/break clause on the contracts were.
Those type of break clauses are likely to be disproportionately expensive compared to the original contract. You can see why, as Sony have spent money marketing them as exclusive.
I’m sure Deathloop will be great and Ghost Wire solid, but MS aren’t going to spend way over the odds to get them back.
Dont think Microsoft is missing much with Ghostwire. Would had loved to play Deathloop but it is what it is.
First it was Phil’s shirts, then it was Phil’s office, now it’s the commercials.
With Sony. Not to mention all those various clauses in case of cancellation etc. It is just not worth it to worsen business relations over games. We got lucky with Starfield though. Phew. God Howard saved gaming again - I have no idea how Sony was able to get those 2 games but failed with Starfield.
As far as I know when Sony purchased Psygnosis it also honored the contracts.
Crap. Completely forgot about a possible monetary penalty for voiding a contract early. In this case, it definitely makes sense to keep it all as is. Still disappointing though.
Contrary to what the drive-by moderation suggests, I’ve never said they shouldn’t honor existing contracts. I do however think it has been a lot of these existing deals, contracts and games with almost every studio that MS have bought since 2018, and it will be nice when they can all focus solely on Xbox.
I’m not sure how that constitues a console warring approach, but I guess I will find out next week.
Next week?
The bigger question I have is whether Deathloop and Ghostwire: Tokyo will be available Day One on Xbox Game Pass PC. Would be a cool way to still make these games accessible to the wider Xbox community.
I’m guessing no
That would be an excellent way to make things better.
All I know is I have a Twisted Tea chillin’ in the fridge for either:
So whichever comes first gets the Tea. I mean I can always buy more Twisted Tea, but this one I’ve been saving since the Superbowl when the grocery store was having a dollar sale on all single serving alcohol.
This whole existing contract is a grey area. For example Disney is not paying authors of old Star Wars books royalties. They claim those contracts are with Lucas Inc and not with them. It’s a legal grey area and if a company lawyer-up they can get away with alot of things.
Whenever they’re able to release on PC, I don’t see why they couldn’t have it as part of the Game Pass PC too.
Wouldn’t GamePass on PC require a Windows Store version? There’s no GamePass on Steam yet. So without a Windows Store version it couldn’t be on GP on PC.
I think they can’t put these games on microsoft store
I think that if Starfield had been one of those games MS definitely would have done such a thing, but Deathloop and Ghostwire? Eh. They don’t exactly seem like “heavy hitters” to me, not like a brand new IP from a developer like BGS.
It probably would have been a big hassle to get out of the Deathloop and Ghostwire deals too, but that I don’t know. But yeah, after those deals have been honored it should be done. Bethesda has found a new home and it’s going to make Xbox even bigger than it already is. I just can’t see a scenario this year (assuming it releases this year) where they announce the release date for Starfield and say it’s coming for PS too, for all the mentioned reasons and the fact that Xbox already doesn’t have much big stuff (except for Halo) this year, you’d be nuts not to keep this exclusive. And even if they do end up supporting platforms outside of Xbox, you can bet it’ll be a year or more for those games.
I agree though, it’s a very odd look that the first release Bethesda game after acquisition is a timed PS5 exclusive, and later on another one. Sigh. It really shows how Sony was indeed going after all the big pubs to get deals done, hell, they still are.
Deathloop and Ghostwire: Tokyo will be available Day One on Steam and BethesdaNet, the latter which will belong to Microsoft once both of these games release.
Just to be clear: I don’t think they’ll be available on Xbox Game Pass for PC on Day One despite releasing on a Microsoft owned launcher (BethesdaNet). Yet it’s … Quite an interesting situation if you actually think about it, to say the least.
But we’ll see.
https://bethesda.net/de/store/product/DE1CD1PCBG01BASE?edition=DE1CDXPCBG01
That is what I am wondering too. I really want to play the two games, but $90 a pop here in Canada knowing they are coming to Xbox, with the possibility that any progress I make can only be carried over to any sequel if they make it an ecosystem exclusive has me wary. I want to play the games in the Xbox ecosystem if possible, and if I could save $200, that’d be amazing.