Pretty sure there were lulu tweets before EU soft approved too, no?
I'm a bit behind on the lore but why does Lulu always go so hard with her tweets?I know she's a Activision employee and wants this to go through but as a high level employee aren't those tweets counter intuitive?Not saying she's wrong to post them,just kinda curious.
What pressure though? These CMA people aren't elected. They're not beholden to public opinion. Why would they care?
I mean honestly market leaders have always affected markets through lobbying. Hell MS has done it extensively themselves throughout the years.
Just look through her twitter. She is amazingly outspoken for a major exec and posts memes pretty often as well. Clearly she is very invested in the deal going through and clearly has the permission of ABK leadership to post this stuff so they must assume it isn't hurting them.
There gonna have to do something after promising abk to there userbase an to feed the gamepass beast, I have s feeling well see a unprecedented partnership between abk an ms if cma blocks this deal. But yea they weren't planning in stopping anyway per Satya an Phil
Gotta love how LuLu gets some people so upset for some reason😄
Last edited:
Basically, MS good cop, ABK bad cop. See Kotick's Death Valley comment too e.g.
At the point of the listed games Xbox was blocking cross play fully asx eg the reason why they didn't got FF14.
Square explains why there's no Final Fantasy XIV for Xbox
Unable to share servers cross-platform Microsoft’s policies for Xbox Live are the reason there isn’t an Xbox 360 or Xbox...
www.destructoid.com
What Sony didn't wanted is to lose their revenue due to crossplay as multiplayer games started to be heavy on micro transactions while being the main Plattform of the games. The mentioned crossplay compensation is afaik only for the case when the gamer is using the PlayStation less than 80% or alike.
Agreed, I don't think it would be possible for them not to suspect a lot of these arguments aren't coming from a sincere place. Hopefully due diligence takes precedence, whichever way that ends up falling.
Pretty much, Sony hold all the cards here wrt to CoD on PS. They're happy with the status quo where they already have the advantage, and their dominant market position means that MS aren't going to pull CoD off PS so why the hell should they play ball and agree to worse terms? Even if the deal ends up going through, Sony have played this how they should IMO, minus any potential bridge burning with AB.
Love the 150 million number that MS pulled out of there ass. Good luck getting a fraction of that with Cloud Streaming.
Poorly timed imo.
It really brings Sony's argument home that Microsoft would rather negotiate through media.
Pretty much provides the info that Sony isn't willing to negotiate which is not good for their argument.
What is she fabricating? The regulators have decided that nintendo is in a separate market.
It's gonna be interesting to see if this gets blocked how the relationship between ABK and Sony evolves.
Tbf if Sony literally said "We don't want to negotiate" then I see why they're taking this route.
If Sony's stance is blocking the merger outright, what's there to negotiate? 🤔
Even the full page ad is just an extension of the conference they had in the EU where Brad Smith had 'Sony's contract' ready to sign. It apparently worked for the EU, so Microsoft must feel like it's a good possibility it will work here. Whether or not they succeed, we'll see.
That's pretty much the only avenue MS have for negotiation seeing as Sony slammed the door shut on any talks the day this merger was announced.
It's not mentioning Sony at all here though... Microsoft trying to garner support has nothing to do with negotiating with Sony, pretty sure Sony was referring to Xbox heads taking press questions to talk about offers to Sony or back pocket agreement Brad Smith, this isn't that.
Last edited:
Nintendo players would be a big chunk of that 150M. I think Nvidia Geforce Now is up there in player base as well.
Tell me exactly what do you think they're gonna do at this point?
Try to buy another big publisher? EA and Take-Two are the ones that are relevant enough and would face similar issues that Activision is getting due FIFA and GTA.
Try to get some japanese publisher in order to "make Sony lose"? No Japanese publisher is big enough to make the move they want and most of them already have a lot of deals with Sony, so even if they acquire, those deals would be problematic.
Try to get more big AAA day one on gamepass? Not only this could've be made a long time ago and didn't, but most pubs don't see that as worth it. MS itself started with acquisition because it was cheaper than making deals for big games.
The only viable thing they will be able to do is setup up for a new generation, but giving another gen advantage for Sony expand their ecosystem and their user libraries grow is not a smart thing.
It's as simple as this - Sony wants to be able to continue to make deals with an independent Activision, not to be making deals by the grace of their biggest competitor. They've made no secret of that with regs, their pitch to them is that an independent Activision, or independent 'CoD' more specifically, is important to competition.
Last edited:
Then it's a good thing they are the only ones left arguing against the merger. Google's arguments are BS and Nvidia is now pro MS/ABK. We know where EA, T2 and Valve stand...Sony is on its own.
Last edited:
If you think that brings Sony's laughable argument "home" after ABK and Microsoft have gone on record multiple times saying Sony refuses to answer calls, then I don't know what to tell you.
I can see an unprecedented partnership form if the deal falls through for sure. And yeah, they are gonna continue to buy studios no matter what happens. I just don't see them buying up random studios to spite Sony.
I think the EU's decision will probably be in spite of PR activities, not because of them. For MS I think these things are just about signalling to investors that no stone is left unturned… unless they know something we don't about the vulnerability of these processes to political pressure that might be effected through the media.
Oh there's plenty they can do, so many studios out there that they could an probably will acquire, yes they would most definitely increase there money hat bag, if abk wants to be petty things can really get ugly if they go scorch earth an essentially just hand ms marketing rights to cod. An yes Japanese acquisitions wouldn't hurt. Abk isn't this end of the road play, plenty of moves to be made with 66 billion on the table, in fact I'm sure phil an satya have already been gameplanning if this deal fails
No, they changed that policy and started to push publically for crossplay later (most likely due to their deteriorating market position) hence why there's talk of FFXIV coming to Xbox every so often.
I am not sure what they are going to negotiate. Sony probably wants a permanent deal and not a 10 year deal. Also going by what was just released today they claim the 10 year offer is very open ended in certain parts when it comes to parity. I doubt MS is going to change their offer very much at this point.
Even if Sony loses the marketing it still means that they achieve what they probably really want. MS doesn't get COD on Gamepass day 1. Also Sony will still be able to bid for the marketing rights and MS will have to spend on an initiative that doesn't give them Gamepass value.
These headlines are the exact opposite of what Sony were hoping for:
View: https://twitter.com/VGC_News/status/1633502868769742848
View: https://twitter.com/VGC_News/status/1633502868769742848
I don't know what happened with Paragon... FF14 wasn't on Xbox, because cross play has to be optional on Xbox and SE didn't want to provide Xbox exclusive servers for the MMO. Yoshi also hated that Xbox FF14 players would've needed to pay for two subscription (monthly MMO fee and Gold). There was no direct blockade for crossplay. SE and Xbox couldn't agree on details.
Multiple developers said Sony is at fault for no cross play between consoles. No crossplay for Fortnite on PS4 lead to a massive shitstorm. Sure MS and Nintendo take advantage of the good PR, but MS wasn't alone in this push. Developers and gamers were part of it.
/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/11524207/ukbmAPj.jpg)
Sony is blocking Fortnite cross-play between PS4 and Nintendo Switch players
You can cross-play with Xbox One, PC, Mac, and mobile players, though
www.theverge.com
I also don't know why it matters that these platforms holders had cross play games before the issues, which happened at different times. FF11 was crossplay between 360, PS and PC. Yet FF14 for example had issues with Xbox and other games had issues with Sony in regards to cross play. Opinion and leadership can change. That's also why these contracts for CoD are so important, because they'll ensure Nintendo and Nvidia get CoD even if Nadella or Spencer leave one day after the acquisition is granted.
Last edited:
Not really. Sony acknowledged the offer in the response and said that it would not be fiscally possible to pay for it and keep PS+ at it's current price. Unless people really think that PS+ would be able to handle a drastic increase in price just to offer COD.
Sure, but that ad isn't directed at Sony but the CMA.
I know. That wasn't my point. Microsoft is currently negotiating with the CMA. What's the point of that ad other than putting pressure on your negotiating partner?
I'm sure the CMA is now more likely to agree on this point with Sony.
That's why it's poorly timed imo.
Sony is the one complaining that Microsoft won't negotiate with them.
This is probably what Lulu means when she says "Sony was offered a better deal than ABk could ever give them". I mean the CMA at some point will have to realize what's actually going on here. The EC seem to have caught on..Lol
Because It's meaningless if they can't afford the price to do this. Which Microsoft knows they can't.
Oh I agree. It was just a counterpoint to those who were equating a full page ad and Lulu tweets to 'it's over, deal is dead'. Point we were making is that Microsoft did a similar thing in the EU and if reports are to be believed, it seems that the EU is leaning to approving the deal.
Nonsense. Microsoft has also generously offered Sony a chance to outbid them for ABK, but they have refused at every opportunity. Pick up your phone, Jim!
Though this may lightly irk them, I think they're probably too professional to let it interfere with their judgment. I'm sure it's not the first time they've seen parties making representations that might be considered a bit naive or as talking past them, so it's probably pretty easy to ignore. In the PF they sort of allude to the squabbling between Sony and MS over deal negotiations, for example, and basically made clear they don't give a f. Similarly about stuff like this, I think they'll easily brush it off as antics not worth much attention.
Yeah. I think Lulu is just in battle mode and won't deviate from that until this thing is approved.
First, you're really expecting they'll spend $69b in such stuff? Come back to reality. They're spending that amount on Activision because it will give such returns. Second, as I said, none of these moves will move the needle for what they need right now, which is the expansion of Gamepass and a franchise that would generate a lot of revenue to keep them afloat. Feel everyone really underestimates what this deal failing means.