UK Block Microsoft/Xbox's $69 Billion Purchase Of Activision Blizzard, May Kill The Whole Deal

SOURCES

TOP PATRONS
[CIPHER]
- Devon B
- Joseph Lavoie
[BIG BOSS]
- Jonathan Ball
[BOSS]
- Gerardo Andrade
- Michael Redmond
- Peter Vrba
[LEGENDARY]
- azalea
- BattleBladeWar

[YongYea]

From Redfall's launch reception to the likelihood that the UK might've killed the Activision Blizzard deal, Xbox has been having an awful week.


TOP PATRONS
[CIPHER]
- Devon B
- Joseph Lavoie
[BIG BOSS]
- Jonathan Ball
[BOSS]
- Gerardo Andrade
- Michael Redmond
- Peter Vrba
[LEGENDARY]
- azalea
- BattleBladeWar

[OmnipotentO]

Idc about the acquisition fanboy wars or whatever but the fact that video games of all things get this level of scrutiny while telecom monopolies exist and Disney owning everything and that gets zero attention from these governments. it's mind-boggling.

[DaosVasheer]

I like how folks who were born way after 2000 don't know about Microsoft's Antitrust lawsuit they lost in the mid 90s. At that time, they were literally bullying and aggressively buying any and nearly ALL OS developers into submission. They were quite literally stealing code from other OS from different developers. Finally, Microsoft was the first to enforce PC makers into OEM contracts for Windows and making it difficult for other installation of any other OS on a PC or removal of Windows. I believe this is what the CMA has looked into when it arrived at its decision.

[ozzcoremidmx]

Whether the deal is approved or not I think Microsoft will not be able to make another acquisition of this level

[ericfrom]

Imagine if they took even half of the money Microsoft was happy to blow on Activision and invested that in their studios and attracting quality talent.

[jackdreas]

So you're telling me that the failure of Google Stadia is connected to the reason why this deal is getting blocked? Wild times man

[silverdamascus]

90% of the movie and TV industry is in the hands of 5 conglomerates (Disney, Warner, Paramount, Universal and Sony), this is a major reason why Hollywood sucks, even when they release good movies, they don't want to create new things and want to just keep recycling what they already have, and these conglomerates also own journalism companies, making things even worse.

Disney buying Marvel, Lucasfilm and Fox didn't go well, for the people who liked the franchises Disney bought and for the people who liked Disney before those acquisitions.

Warner Bros. and Discovery merger caused many projects to be cancelled, including some of them that were finished, and even works that were already released were removed from distribution.

Activision and Blizzard merging was terrible for Blizzard fans.

20 years later, most people agree that SquareSoft and Enix becoming Square-Enix allowed us to play some great games and there are franchises that stayed well, but overall, the merger was bad for those who liked what both companies had to offer.

EA has a history of buying smaller companies, ruining them and their franchises, and shutting them down.

Before Konami became a terrible company, they bought and absorbed Hudson, not only ruining the Castlevania, Contra and many other Konami franchises, but also ruining Bomberman, Adventure Island and other Hudson franchises.

But relax, Microsoft buying Activision is going to be good for us and Blizzard will be fixed, trust me bro, everyone who complains is a whiny and envious Sony fanboy.

[bananasean]

I think Microsoft needs to consolidate and refocus on quality before they get an other studio under their belt.

[WhoisPersona]

Speaking as a Halo player I think Microsoft needs to focus on proving they can look after their flagship franchise rather than purchasing even more studios to then shepherd. If Microsoft cared they would have not allowed Halo Infinite to be released and the problem doesn't even lie with just Halo alone, Redfall is one of the first Bathesda games released with Microsoft as the owner of the studio and from what I've seen things aren't looking too great.

[loki.odinson]

There's one glaring component you forgot to mention, which is that around page 300 or so of the CMA's decision, Google was mentioned as one of the key blockers of this deal in regards to cloud gaming.

[Jak-lgkz]

Question is though . . . Is Sony really the only one thats against this deal? Only a few or a handful of documents were shown to the public. What if other documents provided to the CMA are from other companies that are against it? Like Google, Amazon, or Apple. Kinda weird that they're very quiet about this since the concern is about cloud gaming. So far the console section were shown to the public but other document concerns/remedies are very discreet.

[mattstanford]

Oh no. A giant corporation doesn't get bigger.

How sad for Microsoft.

[supdudd]

Microsoft can barely even handle owning Bethesda, as we’ve seen with Redfall. What makes us think they can handle managing the shitshow that is Activision-Blizzard?

[KotRFFXIV]

Just the fact Bobby wants it to go through should be enough to realise this isn't a good deal, at least not for the gaming industry, it'll be great for him!

[KageTact]

With how poorly Microsoft has been managing what it is has maybe this isn’t a bad thing. I’m waiting to see if Starfield becomes another mess.

[silverdamascus]

While I don't agree with the excuse used to block this purchase (Cloud gaming? Seriously?), I agree with the decision, two billion-dollar companies merging, or one buys another, is almost never good for the customer, if these mergers and acquisitions keep happening, someday we will have only 5 or 6 AAA companies controlling 90% of the videogame market while indie studios control the rest, the movie and TV industry is already like this.

Many people only look at the short term, cheap games on Game Pass, and not the long term, just like when Disney bought Fox, the movie and TV industry was already bad, it got worse, but they only looked at X-Men joining the MCU.

[Freesorin]

I am not at all upset about this outcome. Regardless of what the arguments made on either side of this are it will always be better for the consumer to limit the consolidation of corporate power as much as possible. And let’s be honest, should we really trust any big business when they promise to “play nice?”

[biglevian]

I own an Xbox and short term it'd be great to get those games included in gamepass, also AB needs new ownership. But those kind of deals should really not be allowed. Giants eating other giants isn't good longterm even if Xbox was a benevolent giant who only had the best consumer interests in mind. Which they don't, they just aren't number one right now, so they need to be more consumer conscious.

[LastHazzerd]

Would be nice to jave this level of scrutiny applied to the film, tv, and music industry as well.
then telecommunications and internet service providers.
etc.etc.etc.

[EGraf]

sometimes I think people forget we are talking about microsoft here... not precisely a company that has a good track record on these topics