Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Microsoft to acquire ZeniMax Media and Bethesda Softworks for $7.5B

bethesda.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 798 posts

Re: Microsoft to acquire ZeniMax Media and Bethesda Softworks for $7.5B

#91

Post by antonyh »

Bethesda has become formulaic, with the elements of gameplay virtually the same amongst titles. Same across the board really, not much genre-defying for quite a while.

Outer Worlds, Fallout, and so on just differ by visuals and story, the general jist is all samey samey. No innovation. No just single series but across the estate. Nothings been as good as Fallout 3 & Skyrim, just repetitions and echoes of greatness.

Is this a good purchase for MS? Maybe, if it's for tech, IP, and bringing talent on board. Hopefully they'll add some originality in game play elements, not just reskinning.

Re: Microsoft to acquire ZeniMax Media and Bethesda Softworks for $7.5B

#92

Post by 013a »

staticman2 wrote: post #20
abluecloud wrote: post #9

microsoft are seeing that the money is going to be made in a subscription model for games. by purchasing the studios it makes it much easier for them to bundle games (possibly with exclusivity) with their gamepass. i know i'm more likely to subscribe to gamepass (and keep it running for years) vs. the 1/2 games i buy a year.

I wonder if they are moving to a subscription model because players hate the Windows store and basically refuse to use it instead of Steam when purchasing games. Having failed at running a store I wonder if they've decided plan b is running a rental service.

Well if nothing else, it makes people use their new React Native Xbox app, which is quite possibly the worst windows application Microsoft has ever produced (and they've produced a lot of very bad ones).

Re: Microsoft to acquire ZeniMax Media and Bethesda Softworks for $7.5B

#93

Post by nix23 »

gravypod wrote: post #60
bsagdiyev wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is The Outer Worlds? I heard it is basically space Fallout, which if that is half as good as it sounds I am all over it.

It's Fallout: Firefly. Space western fallout game with quirky characters, hard moral dilemmas, and no one telling you what's right/wrong.

So it is a Lifesimulator?

Re: Microsoft to acquire ZeniMax Media and Bethesda Softworks for $7.5B

#94

Post by apatters »

francis_t_catte wrote: post #22

Soon we'll just have Microsoft, Epic, and a conglomeration of EA, Activision, and Ubisoft after Bobby Kotick forces them all to merge. Facebook will bungle up any chance they have of capturing the gaming market after writing a cryptic paragraph about their legal right to request blood samples from all Oculous users in the TOS. Valve will quietly exit software development altogether, and pivot to building custom vanit…

Sure, if you ate McDonald's every day you'd probably think that there are no good restaurants anymore.

My top 4 games by playtime in the last few years were Rimworld, Oxygen Not Included, Dwarf Fortress and WoW Classic. Honorable mentions go to Spelunky and Stellaris. It's to everyone's great regret that a single one of these titles was purchased by one of the shitty publishers you mentioned, fortunately it's the one that's on its last legs.

Re: Microsoft to acquire ZeniMax Media and Bethesda Softworks for $7.5B

#95

Post by gimmeThaBeet »

lewisj489 wrote: post #28
als0 wrote: post #18

Microsoft bought the legendary game company Rare some time ago. That acquisition didn't go well, so I hope this works out well for Bethesda.

How did it not go well? > Kinect Sports Rivals Great game > Sea of Thieves Another great title

the things Rare has been known for were platformers (Banjo Kazooie, Donkey Kong) and FPS games (Goldeneye, Perfect Dark).

Perfect Dark Zero in 2005 was probably the last title in either of those veins, which was a launch title for the 360 (soon to be 2 consoles ago!)

Sea of Thieves is certainly a feather in their cap, it's just a bit disappointing that we haven't been able to see Rare take a modern crack at the things they were so known for, if that's even possible now.

Re: Microsoft to acquire ZeniMax Media and Bethesda Softworks for $7.5B

#96

Post by me_me_me »

akhilcacharya wrote: post #74
LanceH wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was expecting you to finish with valve pivoting to hats.

I mean, the joke is funny but realistically it's clear that Valve is getting back in the game, so to speak, and we're probably going to see some VR followup to Alyx in the next year or two.

I dunno about this. The current consensus of community is that Dota 2 is dying and valve couldn't be bothered doing anything about it. Just cashing in while they can.

And Dota 2 is by far their biggest game.

Re: Microsoft to acquire ZeniMax Media and Bethesda Softworks for $7.5B

#97

Post by 013a »

tehbeard wrote: post #70
Goronmon wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quake is made by id Software. ZeniMax Media owns id Software. Microsoft just aquired ZeniMax Media.

That's stating a chain of ownership, not why it's ironic..

Its my understanding that, back in the day, Quake was "the" poster child game for OpenGL's capabilities over D3D. Similar to today, how Doom Eternal is "the" poster child for Vulkan. And now Microsoft owns id software.

Re: Microsoft to acquire ZeniMax Media and Bethesda Softworks for $7.5B

#98

Post by Wowfunhappy »

Andrex wrote: post #67
SSLy wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nintendo is self-sustainable, Apple is exerting a lot of influence among smaller studios with Arcade. Like Annapurna Interactive (which is nota bene funded by Oracle).

Nintendo is just two bad generations of hardware from being vulnerable enough to sell itself (IMO.) They had only $4.3 billion cash on hand as of 2018 (surely more by now thanks to the success and maturation of the Switch.) But Microsoft just dropped a little less than double that on ZeniMax. I wish Nintendo were in such a rock-solid place where I'd feel confident about them existing forever like Disney but I don't t…

> But Microsoft just dropped a little less than double that on ZeniMax.

And there you have a key difference between Microsoft and Nintendo.

Re: Microsoft to acquire ZeniMax Media and Bethesda Softworks for $7.5B

#100

Post by Pandabob »

abluecloud wrote: post #9

microsoft are seeing that the money is going to be made in a subscription model for games. by purchasing the studios it makes it much easier for them to bundle games (possibly with exclusivity) with their gamepass. i know i'm more likely to subscribe to gamepass (and keep it running for years) vs. the 1/2 games i buy a year.

Honestly, their investment into game pass and cloud streaming is currently making me choose an Android phone over the new iPhone.

I feel like actual AAA gaming has never been more accessible than it is now.

Post reply on HN