Phil Spencer, líder do Xbox.
Xbox and Activision-Blizzard continue to make significant progress in progressing the negotiation. After the decisive victory against the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in court, the US antitrust body abandoned all forms of opposition.
Despite the concerns raised regarding the acquisition of Call of Duty, the Redmond company managed to provide all the necessary guarantees to avoid the danger of a possible monopoly. The appeal filed by the FTC was in fact rejected, leaving practically zero the chances of the agreement being blocked in the United States.
Now the Federal Trade Commission, in particular, is ready to negotiate, while the European Commission has started to impose conditions to plausibly prevent such things from happening in the future.
The basis of part of the concerns lies in the fact that Microsoft’s empire in the gaming sector is so multifaceted that it is difficult to define, between mobile, PC and obviously consoles.
With the acquisition of Activision-Blizzard, Microsoft would effectively have control over a ton of franchises and genres all at once. Some names to get an idea: Elder Scrolls, Fallout, Starfield, Wasteland, Pillars of Eternity, Avowed, Clockwork Revolution, The Outer Worlds, Fable, Gears, Halo, Call of Duty, Overwatch, DOOM, Wolfenstein among others.
For this reason, as Wccftech reports, the European Commission has carefully coded video game product types, including genresin order to better catalog future operations.
No last document (you can find it here), the control commission defined some details regarding the gambling market:
“The Advisory Committee agrees with the conclusions of the Commission in the draft decision regarding the definition of relevant product markets for the development and publication of video games segmented by platform (PC, console, smartphones), por game type of game (AAA games vs. non-AAA games) and by gender (action and adventure, shooter/battle royale, RPG, sports, racing, combat and strategy).”
This means that, in the case of future acquisitions, the European Commission will be able to control the number of products owned by Microsoft (and who makes other similar acquisitions) for each specific genre with the objective of avoiding the creation of monopolies.
By that rule, Microsoft is free to acquire Japanese studios, but would have serious problems buying big RPG, FPS or racing studios. It is worth remembering that the company is highly strong in this genre, and buying a CD Projekt Red can be problems for them. On the other hand, Sony could get into trouble trying to acquire Japanese studios under this rule.
When Call of Duty comes to Xbox Game Pass, as already confirmed, it will be difficult for Microsoft to acquire other development studios or franchises dedicated to shooters.
2023-07-22 15:31:41
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