Microsoft and Sony have been at odds for about a year and a half due to the intentions of the former to buy Activision-Blizzard King, in what would be, by far, the most expensive operation in the entire history of the video game market. Let us remember that when barely a few weeks had passed since the beginning of 2022, those of Redmond and ABK announced the acquisition, worth almost 70,000 million dollars, and that from the first moment Sony began to show its teeth, resorting to all kinds of of measures to try to avoid the operation.
A year and a half later, everything is on hold, after a large number of regulators have been in favor of the operation, but also with the refusal of the British CMA and with the American FTC in a position that, pending its final opinion, also seems quite critical. If the US federal body finally gives the green light, it is most likely that the operation will be completed, but if it vetoes it in its national territory, it will most likely mean the end of said plans, except for the resources of the possible appeals and their judicial route.
Activision-Blizzard King’s role in PlayStation exclusives policy is undoubtedly at the epicenter of this hurricane.Although Sony has tried to steer the discussion towards other areas, such as cloud gaming or subscription services. And it is that, for better or for worse, since this depends on the opinion of each one, exclusive games are a key element in the sales policies of Microsoft and Sony consoles.
However, as we can read in Wccftech, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is against the exclusive games model, and advocates its removal. These statements have been made in the hearings that are being carried out at the request of the FTC, which has requested a provisional blocking of the purchase operation, as it seems to fear that Microsoft and ABK would complete it before their final pronouncement, as this could mess up the situation.
“If it were up to me I would like to get rid of the exclusivity on consoles”, he said as part of his testimony. «But that’s not for me to especially define it as a low-share player in the console market. The dominant player there [Sony] has defined market competition using exclusives, so that’s the world we live in«. And he added: “I don’t like that world«.
Obviously, Nadella’s opinion is one thing, and Microsoft’s current policy in this regard is quite another. Let’s remember, without going any further, that in the still recent Xbox Showcase 2023, quite a few titles were shown that will be exclusive to Xbox + PC. However, it is true that Even if Microsoft abandoned that model, it seems highly unlikely that Sony would follow suit..
