Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#361

Post by radiKal07 » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 8:12 AM UTC

cman1444 wrote: post #312

KingMachiavelli wrote: post #297

The real issue is Sony has many exclusives which gives Microsoft a better case (despite the judge saying it's NOT about Sony). It certainly harms consumers, so I don't see how the court still approved this especially with the judge's comment against the comparison to Sony. Almost all mergers of this size harm consumers, the fact that it's allowed by default is the crucial issue. If the FTC still had a spine they woul…

I disagree with the opinion that it harms consumers. The economist has an article it recently published that argues that this deal actually helps consumers by speeding up the transition to "streaming" games and cloud gaming as an option. I tend to agree. Just because one large company is buying another large company doesn't mean the deal should be blocked.

you are completely disconnected from reality my guy

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#362

Post by lucubratory » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 8:20 AM UTC

darknavi wrote: post #2

Microsoft employee here, opinions my own. I work in gaming at Microsoft and I really enjoy it. I think Microsoft gives us a ton of space to explore and make our own impact and I am a huge fan* of Phil Spencer. > Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision has been described as the largest in tech history. It deserves scrutiny. That scrutiny has paid off: Microsoft has committed in writing, in public, and in court to keep C…

The judge considers it reasonable because if the market is as the FTC defines it and if Call of Duty is actually an essential input for a competitor in the "high-performance gaming console" space, then those commitments from Microsoft give Sony ten years to innovate and come up with a replacement for CoD. It makes a lot more sense if you read the whole judgement, Judge Corley is basically saying "Most of what the FTC is asserting is questionable, but even if we assume that their assertions are correct, the argument to temporarily prevent & potentially permanently ban the deal to prevent harm there is little evidence for is not strong enough to harm Microsoft and Activision in this way". There's other stuff that had some impact as well, like how the FTC knew the deals deadline (six days from now) more than a year ago, but only chose to bring the PI motion recently, giving Microsoft barely any time to prepare (and making the federal judge in this case have to work some unusual hours, including the entire weekend, because it's now so time critical). Basically, a lot more went into this decision than just the ten year agreements.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#363

Post by elefanten » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 8:21 AM UTC

tonymet wrote: post #266

As much as i want Blizzard games included in Game Pass, this will end up resulting in lower quality games titles . Fewer studios are going to be able to compete

Yeah, this is the real danger of the deal.

Most likely, it will: 1. First, be good for consumers short-term as MS floods the market with high quality cheap content. 2. Next, be bad for the games industry medium term as their product gets devalued and only the biggest winner-take-all free to play games can compete vs. the value of bundled content 3. Next, be bad for gaming employees and entrepreneurs as the value of their roles gets squeezed and the nature of working in the industry become more constrained and formulaic 4. Finally, end up bad for consumers when the quality and variety of viable gaming products declines.

Sadly, the FTC and CMA chose to base their cases on a bunch of abject nonsense, so I'm grateful that the FTC has rightfully lost the crummy case that it made. And the CMA is also about to rightfully lose / surrender next.

But the key words of my take are "most likely". Games market changes too much to make long term predictions about. The countervailing forces are increasingly cheaper and easier creator tools, as well as the rising difficulty of maintaining a meaningful hardware edge.

From the public policy perspective, it's much more urgent to come up with meaningful and sound legal doctrines against excessive market power than it is to litigate speculative crap based on the optics of resisting big price tags. Lina Khan's performative career boosterism has been a huge failure because she's just as greedy and anti-social as every stereotype about corporate management. But I have faith that a framework which doesn't rely on spectacle and punditry can be found. The EU is trailblazing in that area where the US and UK are still completely primitive.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#364

Post by AmericanChopper » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 8:35 AM UTC

elefanten wrote: post #360

AmericanChopper wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry buddy, you’ve fallen for fake news. Microsoft has said they’ll bring it to Nintendo, not the Switch, and the timeframe they’ve announced for this is sometime in the next 10 years. Most non-tabloid commentators seem to think this means it will either be delivered by a streaming service, or to a yet-to-be announced new console. In any case, if it happens it will have to be accompanied by a shift in Nintendo’s pos…

All market segments have subsets and supersets. Why should the line be drawn where you imply? Is Sony monopolizing the God of War market because God of War fans understand how those games are differentiated to appeal to their preferences? The FTC's case that PS and Xbox exist in their own "high-performance console" market is the contrived argument. Honestly, it's dated to even consider consoles their own market. Prod…

I didn’t invent this segment, the market did when Nintendo had the insight to gamble on there being demand for lower-powered consoles (and more recently with an added focus on portability) to play less graphically demanding games on. A decision consumers subsequently validated by buying over 100,000,000 of them. Granted it wasn’t that much of a gamble, as by the time they made the Switch, this had already become Nintendo’s entire brand identity.

The Switch simple can’t do the same things that an Xbox or PlayStation can do. Many of those consoles top selling games would not be playable on a Switch, because they’re high performance games that require high performance hardware, and the Switch simply isn’t a viable substitute for that. Even for the most graphically demanding games that can run on a Switch, they can only do so with comparatively low resolution and frame rate, which in case you didn’t know, are major selling points for the segments that Microsoft/Sony are competing in.

If you don’t want to accept these plainly obvious facts, why don’t you go and inform r/NintendoSwitch that it’s a viable substitute for a PS5, and see how many people you can convince?

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#365

Post by Sai_ » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 8:40 AM UTC

deutschepost wrote: post #344

QuesnayJr wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A judge ended the rule that studios couldn't own theaters in 2020: https://www.forbes.com/sites/tomnunan/2020/08/07/judge-decre...

It is a very weird coincidence that every major film studio started streaming services after that law ended. I thought it was more general like a cut between production and distribution not production and theatres. Now we are in the same position as a hundred years ago. At that time you would have to go into a theatre by the production company and now you have to go to the streaming service of the production company.…

> That split between production and distribution has to come back.

What if Netflix had made and won that argument before 2020 to prevent production companies from also streaming content? I think Netflix missed a trick here.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#366

Post by tacocataco » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 8:49 AM UTC

charcircuit wrote: post #192

AlexandrB wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All I know about that is I tried to migrate my Mojang account to Microsoft - when Microsoft started "unifying logins" - and I still haven't heard back from them. So my experience has been negative. Hopefully they don't try to migrate Battle.net accounts in the future.

FYI you have 2 months to migrate your account before they delete it. You will have to repurchase the game on a new account if you ever want to play it again if you don't migrate it by September 19th.

Thanks for this heads up! Didn't realize I had to stop Microsoft from randomly deciding they can steal the product I already paid for.

I own nothing and am so grateful. /$

Is Microsoft going to buy Steam and delete my game library there next?

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#367

Post by arcanemachiner » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 8:57 AM UTC

bbarn wrote: post #346

jonhohle wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue isn’t about trying out games, it’s about having access to those games in 5, 10, 20 years or later. There is a growing list of digital only titles that are no longer available to new players and may be unavailable to people who “bought” them. I have a bricked Wii with digital games that are tied to the physical console, not any account. There is no way to recover them. Steam has done a remarkable job staying…

The majority of new games can't work offline, and having a physical disc is now so rare that companies are selling game boxes and deluxe editions that contain no software at all - not even a download code, since you need to buy it with an account anyway.

What exactly are they selling if there's no game inside?

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#368

Post by ffhhttt » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 9:05 AM UTC

cman1444 wrote: post #354

NovaDudely wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> argues that this deal actually helps consumers I'm listening... > by speeding up the transition to "streaming" games and cloud gaming Ewww... no thanks!

It's not the Boogeyman you think it is. You used to have to buy a game for $60 and if you didn't like it? Well too bad, that's $60 down the drain. Now you can just move on to the next one. I get that for enthusiasts owning a physical game may be more desirable, but for the majority of gamers (casual gamers) a subscription based service is a better option.

There is a huge difference between subscription services like Xbox game pass and streaming

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#369

Post by raxxorraxor » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 9:14 AM UTC

cman1444 wrote: post #312

KingMachiavelli wrote: post #297

The real issue is Sony has many exclusives which gives Microsoft a better case (despite the judge saying it's NOT about Sony). It certainly harms consumers, so I don't see how the court still approved this especially with the judge's comment against the comparison to Sony. Almost all mergers of this size harm consumers, the fact that it's allowed by default is the crucial issue. If the FTC still had a spine they woul…

I disagree with the opinion that it harms consumers. The economist has an article it recently published that argues that this deal actually helps consumers by speeding up the transition to "streaming" games and cloud gaming as an option. I tend to agree. Just because one large company is buying another large company doesn't mean the deal should be blocked.

I don't believe that streaming games is in the interest of consumers in the slightest.

That said, I don't have a problem with the merger. It won't help consumers and it won't help people working for the studios. That was not the case in any merger in the past.

While they have a lot of solid IPs that will generate billions for years to come, I believe these studios have a hard time to innovate. The likelihood that at some point someone will eat their lunch is pretty high. Gaming IPs have a lot of momentum, but there are always new challengers around the corner.

Re: Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard

#370

Post by hanselot » Wed, Jul 12, 2023, 9:31 AM UTC

Its a bit late to jump in here, but I would just like to share the observation that 90% of the comments here look like they were crafted by Microsoft's PR deparment.

The rule expecting good faith arguments is entirely moot if corporate players can sic their squads of goons on social media.

Almost every comment is something like: "Well, big corporations gonna be corporating, what you gonna do?" or "MS is bad, but are they as bad as [Insert distraction here]" or "I love this move, please promote me microsoft."

And here people will still believe this isn't happening, when the evidence is clear to see for anyone with a slightly skeptical mind.