Just a month ago, the American chain CNBC reported that AT&T would be considering selling Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, usually known as Warner Bros. Games, for a sum close to $ 4 billion. In fact, they revealed that several industry giants had shown interest in taking over the aforementioned video game division. Today The Information disclosed that Microsoft is another of the companies that is pending the possible sale

Sources close to the aforementioned media assure that those from Redmond intend to expand the number of internal studies they currently have. At this point it is important to clarify that the purchase of Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment only includes development studies, not intellectual properties. I mean, franchises like Harry Potter, Batman and LEGO they would remain the property of Warner; the only exception would be Mortal Kombat. At the moment it is not entirely clear how they will manage the issue of licenses.

Even if the sale was only from the creative teams, Microsoft would be adding studies of the stature of Avalanche Software (Disney Infinity), Monolith Productions (Middle-earth: Shadow of War), NetherRealm Studios (Mortal Kombat) and Rocksteady Studios (Batman Arkham), TT Games and the Montreal and Washington studios, among others. They are companies that already have extensive experience in the video game industry; any distributor would want to have them in their ranks.

That is why Redmond’s are not the only ones interested. So much CNBC how The Information agree that the other candidates are Take-Two Interactive, Electronic Arts and Activision Blizzard. Obviously, the operation will begin once AT&T decides to give the green light to the sale. The telecommunications operator intends to get rid of various assets to try to pay off a debt that already exceeds 165,000 million dollars. Warner’s video game division doesn’t seem like a core business to them.

The strategy to strengthen Xbox Games Studios

Microsoft, for its part, is about to start a new path with the Xbox Series X. Those led by Satya Nadella have bought important studios for strengthen the exclusive catalog of its platform, which was far behind the proposals of PlayStation in the current generation. In 2018 they acquired Playground Games (Forza Horizon), Ninja Theory (Lightblade), Compulsion Games (We Happy Few), Undead Labs (State of Decay), Obsidian Entertainment (The Outer Worlds) e inXile Entertainment (Wasteland).