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Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

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Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#441

Post by johnnyanmac »

TillE wrote: post #128

Just the UK CMA standing in the way then, with its flimsy decision resting almost entirely on speculation about the "cloud gaming" market. Microsoft should be offering to to swear off cloud gaming entirely, they should be delighted. Game streaming is a lousy solution that requires enormous investment in specific infrastructure, it would be smart to ignore it and focus on their great subscription service that only req…

>it would be smart to ignore it and focus on their great subscription service that only requires a $500 Xbox.

in the same way that nintendo thought it was smart to ignore online gaming for some 15 years, sure. It was true for a while. Until it wasnt

MS isn't doing this because it's immediately profitable. They feel it's the future, and they can iron out the technical issues. They want to be in the forefront when that arrives instead of playing catchup.

Also, more obviously: Gamepass is on Android and Android isn't playing those games natively. It's another way to target the mobile market.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#442

Post by addisonl »

kipchak wrote: post #409
addisonl wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strawman (gameboy hasn’t been a thing for a decade) but looking past your fallacy I sure do: plenty of kids only get one or the other for Christmas.

Plenty of kids might have also got either a bicycle or a Gameboy for Christmas but I'm not sure this makes them comparable categories.

Ehh simple example to explain the court’s decision—to the average consumer they are most definitely competing devices.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#443

Post by johnnyanmac »

hammeringnails wrote: post #273

Someone please correct me if I'm way off the mark here: I assume the reason behind this purchase is to keep Windows relevant as a gaming platform. It looks as though Windows is becoming less relevant overall as a computing platform, and alternative platforms such as Steam Deck are beginning to pose a major threat to one of their major market demographics: Gaming.

I'm confused how you came to that conclusion. Steam isn't threatening Windows gaming because a linux installed device sold 2m units. An Windows is still very relevant for computing despite more enterprise trying to move off Windows to avoid licensing cost.

I think the reason is much simpler and smaller scale: Microsoft has always been behind in the gaming space and a huge 3rd party company with valuable IPs can bolster some incentive to buy Xbox and even PC's. It also further gives value to gamepass which seems to be their big focus this generation.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#444

Post by LegitShady »

Etherlord87 wrote: post #424
LegitShady wrote: post #401

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear what you're saying but also understand that putting games on gamepass costs money to microsoft in lost sales. It's like Disney - if all their movies go directly to disney+ they're training customers to not spend $60-80 on buying new games and instead wait for them to come to the cheaper monthly subscription. That isn't free - they still have to develop the game, and the return on the game is lower.

You could argue similarly for dumping, and yet it is regulated. Companies shouldn't be allowed to invest in eliminating competition.

You can't pretend moving to a monthly recurring revenue model thats still profitable is dumping, at least not honestly.

My point was that just releasing everything day one on xbox live cannot be a long term sustainable strategy as you're only making $15/month or whatever from that user, but it isn't dumping.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#445

Post by johnnyanmac »

majormajor wrote: post #200
dnissley wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both of these industries are entertainment though -- and to me at least it seems there's a pretty limited amount of consumer harm that could come from various IP exclusivity deals. Again -- am I thinking about this wrong? What is the consumer harm that could result from the moving of IP from one company to another? A truly dedicated fan has to buy a different console to play their favorite game? Non-truly dedicated f…

Why does it matter that it's entertainment? If at some point consumers have to pay more than they would in a more competitive market, how is that not harm? If you believe that this is a move that will result in less consumer choice and more possibility for MS to extract more $$$$, then you don't like it.

>Why does it matter that it's entertainment?

Because it's not a material good that gets in the way of my ability to live. And I say that despite working in entertainment. If a dam breaks down or is owned by some coporate entity that means people may not have access to water.

If Disney owns every single videgame/movie/music/etc and I detest Disney... I find some other pasttime. Hell, maybe I just focus more on foreign media. Sucks for my work but I can find a new job outside of the Mouse. It's a relative minor impact.

>If at some point consumers have to pay more than they would in a more competitive market, how is that not harm?

that's my exact issue. If I can't pay for insulin, I die. if I can't afford COD 2025... what? I don't get to play a video game? Is that "harm" in the traditional sense?

> If you believe that this is a move that will result in less consumer choice and more possibility for MS to extract more $$$$, then you don't like it.

Me not liking something =/= harm. I don't like mushrooms but I wouldn't say they harm me. I just don't like the texture or taste.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#446

Post by johnnyanmac »

xboxnolifes wrote: post #95
dnissley wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both of these industries are entertainment though -- and to me at least it seems there's a pretty limited amount of consumer harm that could come from various IP exclusivity deals. Again -- am I thinking about this wrong? What is the consumer harm that could result from the moving of IP from one company to another? A truly dedicated fan has to buy a different console to play their favorite game? Non-truly dedicated f…

The point is to make sure there is always another console you could move to, and that there is a hundred other fps titles on the market.

yes, all 2 alternatives. Much choice.

There is always phones and PC for "open platform" at least.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#447

Post by shmerl »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #427
shmerl wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why can't MS play along with the industry and support Vulkan on Xbox though? That would make them not look like the worst lock-in examples of the '90s. Feels like these kind of issues are what anti-trust should have handled.

Playstation and Nintendo's support of Vulkan isn't exactly stellar. They support Vulkan the same way Unity/Unreal Engine support Linux.

Playstation - yeah (Sony doesn't care at all so far). Nintendo on the other hand is surprisingly positive about it:

https://www.khronos.org/blog/you-can-use-vulkan-without-pipe...

Which is refreshing.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#448

Post by johnnyanmac »

firebirdn99 wrote: post #256
dnissley wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's literally one game. That's it. Lack of consumer choice when it comes to a single title shouldn't be something that the FTC is getting involved in. Even when you expand that to all the titles that activision/blizzard produce we're talking a tiny drop in a literal ocean of consumer choice.

Should corporations the size of Microsoft (almost 25x of Sony, the 2nd nearest competitor) be allowed to make acquisitions of this size to grow itself, and weaken competition. Antitrust law is one of the FTC's mandates, then this is what they are tasked to do. When (tech) corporations are too big, I can think of many ways it can cause destruction to society. Only have to look at Facebook in the 2016 election. And tec…

>Should corporations the size of Microsoft (almost 25x of Sony, the 2nd nearest competitor) be allowed to make acquisitions of this size to grow itself, and weaken competition.

Sure. Becuase they aren't even a monopoly in the gaming space to begin with. If you could simply outspend to become a major gaming competitor, Amazon should be #1 by now.

It's clearly not that simple so I'm not concerned about Sony suddenly declining. And meanwhile, Nintendo sits in its own throne above Sony/MS as if it's watching two children on a playground.

> I can think of many ways it can cause destruction to society. Only have to look at Facebook in the 2016 election.

Do you really think a loosely historical shooter game most people use to compete against one another will be used to control information for national elections? I simply don't see it, but who knows?

Even if so: the big issue with that comparison is that your grandparents aren't playing COD. Mine were on FB around that time.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#449

Post by johnnyanmac »

failuser wrote: post #207
dnissley wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's just it though -- video games are not "monopolized" in any meaningful sense. A particular IP may be "monopolized" -- e.g. owned by a particular company that has more or less of an interest in producing cross platform versions. But that's not really a monopoly, is it?

Sony and Microsoft are buying game developers left and right. Will the courts allow Microsoft to buy Sony gaming business? Microsoft is also getting ready to eat Steam’s lunch for a while on the PC side. Will that be allowed to go through?

>Will the courts allow Microsoft to buy Sony gaming business?

The gaming business, sure. The rest of Sony is still HQ'd in Japan and in fact manages many semi-needed and needed busineses, so there's zero chance MS buys Sony as a whole.

>Microsoft is also getting ready to eat Steam’s lunch for a while on the PC side

Didn't go too well last decade. Best of luck this time.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#450

Post by johnnyanmac »

zimpenfish wrote: post #414
refracture wrote: post #413

Sporadic thoughts: I'm not impressed with Sony's tantrums over this, they've been throwing money around for exclusivity for years, ranging from exclusive content in major titles (Destiny and CoD have often been 'definitive' on PlayStation) to outright title exclusivity. I'm probably not a good source of opinion on this, Acti-Blizz has become a toxic company that doesn't really make games I like anymore, and I resent…

> I don't see how Microsoft could possibly make things worse, so I'm slightly optimistic I'd look at what they've done with the Minecraft IP since buying it - main game gets no love, infrequent updates, etc., whilst they churn out side-projects like Dungeons and load up Bedrock with monetisation. For sure, it's not "worse" but it's a million miles away from what should have been under good ownership.

Does the main game need love? I feel like MS could die tomorrow and fans would still maintain Minecraft servers until the heat death of the universe.

>it's a million miles away from what should have been under good ownership.

Notch didn't exactly age well in the last 12 years or so, so I'm not sure if that's a good example of "it couldn't be worse".

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