It's ridiculous to champion for the idea, as it wouldn't give anyone anything new, it would just restrict where people can play them. And I don't see why restrictions should be applauded.
You, like quite a few in this thread, simply don't get what MS is doing, nor have any understanding on the direction MS is going and working towards.... Sony and Nintendo are about the traditional console model IE: Make hardware, make strong first party games, push hardware and sell as many units as possible...
Microsoft on the other hand is getting out of this model, and going to a more "Netflix" type of model where it's all about software, and a lot less about what hardware you actually play that software on... This all started with the advent of Play Anywhere, that was the first piece of the puzzle. Opening up a lot of it's big Xbox exclusives as titles that you can play on PC, on Xbox, or both. That was huge and that was MS saying we don't care where you play our games at, or what you play them on, we just want you to play our games...
The 2nd part of this was opening up Xbox Game Pass, which is basically Netflix for videogames, and was done quite well, specially with first party games being on there on the same day as their retail versions. This is opening up a whole new market for games, and for different genre of games as well. I might not be inclined to go out and buy that great linear story driven game because it only lasts around 12 hours or so and has no multiplayer....But when I can have access to that, plus all the other games I want to play out there for one low monthly fee, then suddenly I will give that game a shot, as well as many others I otherwise probably would have never tried....For the price of 2 retail games a year, I now have access to 100s of games a year... There's no if's ands or buts about it, that is one hell of a good deal.
And this, if it turns out to be true, would be the 3rd piece of that puzzle. First people need to understand what MS is intending to do with something like this, it's not about buying up EA to make all of it's games Xbox exclusive. That is not MS's goal. What MS want's access to is the studios and EA's IPs. If MS bought EA, I have no doubts that they would continue to publish all of the current games multi-platform. And in fact, that is MS's biggest goal, it's to get it's software out there on as many devices as possible (more on that in a bit under part 4), but what MS really wants, and needs, is studios to make it's own exclusives.... MS has plenty of great IPs going all the way back to the OG Xbox days, they just don't have the studios to really tap into all of those great properties. What buying EA gives MS is talented studios that can develop their own IPs and help create brand new ones... So part of this is MS wanting to get it's software on as many devices as possible, and that does include Switch and PS4, and the other part of a deal like this would be for MS to develop more of it's own, exclusive software as well. A deal like this would not signal MS getting out of the hardware business, quite the opposite actually, it would however signal that MS wants to be the number one video game publisher across all platforms, but also wants to give it's own hardware a healthy dose of exclusive content as well. Sure you can play a lot of MS games on different devices and platforms, but you will get a bonus of exclusive content if you go out and buy a MS console. After Xbox One X, it's quite clear that MS is in the hardware market and in it to win it. But they are also trying to expand the publishing market, and want to develop videogames as less platform driven and more software driven.
The 4th part of this is actually the streaming part, as MS just bought another videogame tech streaming company. MS wants to open up a streaming service that will allow you to play Xbox games on any device, regardless of hardware... Cell phones, tablets, PCs, etc. This would truly be Xbox Play Anywhere, as it could stream it's software over to really any device which would further open up it's games to an even wider range of people. This isn't something that is going to happen tomorrow or anything like that, but this is something I think they are clearly working towards and want to do.
On one hand this sounds like a completely crazy idea that has no chance in hell of ever happening.....On the other hand, a deal like this would make too much sense for MS not to do, and would fit perfectly on what MS is trying to do and the route they are going.....And please, let's drop the talk about EA being too big for MS to buy.... Anyone offering that up as evidence of this not happening clearly knows nothing about business, MS or EA. MS is a FAR bigger company than EA, MS makes many times more money a quarter than what EA makes in a full year. EA shareholders don't care about EA, they like all shareholders care about one thing, money, and that comes down to the bottom line. If MS offers them more price per share than what their current stock is valued at, it would be a massive win and profit for them, and they would easily approve the take over in a heart beat. And it would be, even at a much higher price, still a drop in the bucket for MS.... I don't think this "could happen", I think it WILL happen, and we would probably hear about this going down before E3 this year...I really think this could be the perfect fit for MS, and make EA a stronger, better company to, as well as help MS open up a brand new business model in the video game industry that could really make things better for all games. Going to be really exciting to see what happens with this...
*Quick Edit*******
Another big part of this that I forgot to mention is Xbox backwards compatibility... MS want's it's full library of games, from OG Xbox all the way through Xbox One and beyond to always be available on one system. They have been working hard towards this for quite some time and it shows with Xbox One X... Xbox one games still play on it, as well as 360 and OG Xbox. Down the road, when MS releases a new Xbox, you will see developers stop making games for Xbox One, Xbox one X will become the new "base" hardware, and the new release will be the high end version. But all Xbox One, 360 and OG Xbox titles will still work just fine on the latest generation of Xbox hardware.... This is pretty amazing actually, now when you upgrade hardware, you don't have to worry about your back catalog of games not working, they will carry over. This is increasingly important as we move more to a all digital format, to be able to have access to every game you have ever bought on any Xbox system. Very cool stuff and all part of MS's bigger plans.
