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

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

#161

Post by apatters »

logicOnly wrote: post #116
apatters wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

This is the inevitable trend of gaming since the 90s. Small team makes innovative and interesting game. Gets bought, makes a good sequel, then milks IP forever. It's up to you to move on.

Absolutely. It's fine for gamers to indulge in some nostalgia, too.

It'd be better for the industry if we all recognized that the job of a guy like Bobby Kotick is to eat a steak every so often, and then vomit it up for the next 25 years. Someone has to drive a garbage truck and there's nothing wrong with paying him for it.

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

#162

Post by metalliqaz »

apatters wrote: post #94
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…

I've been playing a lot of great retro-inspired shooters from the new 3D Realms and New Blood. Plenty of great indie stuff on PC.

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

#163

Post by staticman2 »

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…

Worst case scenario for Nintendo would likely be making Xbox and PS5 games and PC games. I don't think they will ever be for sale.

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

#164

Post by Cthulhu_ »

ekianjo wrote: post #87
fendy3002 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are more: - paradox interactive - rockstar, which is strong from gta v online and rdr - cd projeckt red, which also get income from gog and hyped cyberpunk - valve won't exit software devs in short time, their investment in vr is big. I won't be surprised if they release vanity knives with lootbox though IMO Bethesda decided to sell to MS because their recent games cannot generate enough popularity. They can on…

If Rockstar ever gets acquired, this will be one of the most expensive deals ever. They routinely sell games in the dozens of millions of units.

GTA V, mainly thanks to their online offering, has been the 2nd best selling video game of all time, second only to Minecraft... which Microsoft bought in 2014 for $2.5 billion.

Mind you, Minecraft's income comes from a lot of merchandise and spinoffs, whereas GTA is mainly from the game itself.

I was curious; RDR 2, also a Rockstar game, is the #14 best selling game of all time apparently; I didn't know it did that good. The other GTA games are also in the top 50.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_video_gam...

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

#166

Post by save_ferris »

CivBase wrote: post #39

Bethesda/Zenimax as a whole has had a very rough time of it recently, but their IPs alone are ridiculously valuable and id Software has been killing it lately. I wonder how much Microsoft intends to shake things up. Also, if MS just wants development studios and IPs, I imagine a lot of the publishing arm of the company will be redundant. I wonder what MS intends to do about the publishing staff.

I really hope that they move away from the ESO/MMO format that they've focused on the last few years in regards to Elder Scrolls. I'm a huge fan of that series, but I just have zero interest in playing MMOs, and it's clear that they've been trying to push further into that space as opposed to shipping high-quality single-player games.

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

#167

Post by dawnerd »

Firebrand wrote: post #84

Bethesda Games are not going not be exclusive to Xbox -- Confirmed by Todd Howard: >Like our original partnership, this one is about more than one system or one screen. We share a deep belief in the fundamental power of games, in their ability to connect, empower, and bring joy. And a belief we should bring that to everyone - regardless of who you are, where you live, or what you play on. Regardless of the screen siz…

I don’t know why anyone would think Microsoft would be against publishing on competing platforms. Minecraft is available on Switch and PlayStation. It’s all about that $$$

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

#168

Post by nindalf »

Firebrand wrote: post #84

Bethesda Games are not going not be exclusive to Xbox -- Confirmed by Todd Howard: >Like our original partnership, this one is about more than one system or one screen. We share a deep belief in the fundamental power of games, in their ability to connect, empower, and bring joy. And a belief we should bring that to everyone - regardless of who you are, where you live, or what you play on. Regardless of the screen siz…

That's merely rhetoric. Reading between the lines, it's clear Howard is saying "we're going to release Skyrim on XBox Series X on launch day".

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

#169

Post by zeroonetwothree »

bstar77 wrote: post #159

This just further confirms that my energy and money is going to the indie space. The level of enjoyment I get out of Factorio, Cuphead, Cogmind, Crusader Kings III, Curious Expedition 2, EXA Punks, Elite Dangerous, Kenshi, etc is so much greater than any AAA title I've touched in the past 5 years, yet these games are cheaper and most can run on a potato. I want to play games, not interactive movies.

Paradox isn’t exactly an indie
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