After the decision of the CMA, the steps to be taken by Microsoft and Sony, who want to dominate the sector, will be stronger than in the past.
Microsoft was denied permission from the UK Competition and Markets Authority in its attempt to acquire Activision-Blizzard. Although the company has announced that it will appeal this decision, it seems that a difficult process awaits both Sony and Microsoft from now on.
Are the old console wars returning?
The waters don’t seem likely to settle down in Microsoft’s attempt to buy Activision-Blizzard for $68.7 billion. The statements made after the CMA’s decision show that Microsoft will talk about the issue for a longer time and try different legal ways. However, this pushes us to consider different issues. Let’s start by explaining why Microsoft is trying to buy Activision-Blizard first.
At the beginning of last year, after Microsoft announced that it had bought Activision-Blizzard, the industry was suddenly overwhelmed with questions and even confusion. One of the most important reasons for this was the Call of Duty brand held by Activision. Sony has filed a counterclaim to block the purchase, claiming that this game played a crucial role in the sales of its consoles.
The fact that Microsoft, which suffered a great defeat in the last generation consoles, could not reach the desired progress in the current generation, forced the company to take stronger steps, to be permanent in the sector and to take a bigger share of the cake. Announcements such as a strong game sales platform, new accessories and technologies began to come one after another. He took extremely positive steps to regain his lost reputation in the eyes of the players.
However, it was impossible for them to be enough alone. On the other hand, the most important way to become a more profitable company, which is constantly talked about in the gaming industry, was through the content library. Although Microsoft had important titles, it was not enough to enable the company to achieve the desired rise. For this reason, he preferred the easiest way, the purchasing method.
He started by first buying Bethesda’s parent company, Zenimax. When this acquisition was announced, it did not have the potential to affect other console manufacturers too much. However, the fact that Microsoft is one of the dominant platforms in PC gaming, as well as its place in the game consoles market, would have created an industry that would completely change direction with its acquisition of Activision-Blizzard (and this chance still continues).
The fact that the game brands in the hands of Activision-Blizzard are very strong reveals that Sony’s hand will become weak in these games.
Major game titles owned by Activision-Blizzard
Although not all of the productions on the list make sense for Sony, some of them are among the productions that lead the industry by closing the gap of others.
- Caesar
- Call of Duty
- Candy Crush
- Crash Bandicoot
- Diablo
- DJ Hero
- Empire Earth
- Gabriel Knight
- Geometry Wars
- Guitar Hero
- hearthstone
- Heroes of the Storm
- hexen
- Interstate ’76
- King’s Quest
- Laura Bow Mysteries
- The Lost Vikings
- overwatch
- Phantasmagoria
- pitfall
- Police Quest
- prototype
- Quest for Glory
- singularity
- skylanders
- Soldier of Fortune
- Space Quest
- Spyro the Dragon
- StarCraft
- Tenchu
- TimeShift
- Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater
- True Crime
- World of Warcraft
- hard
Let alone Call of Duty, it means that in addition to productions such as Diablo and Overwatch, brands such as Guitar Hero, Spyro, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater and Crash Bandicoot, which are identified with PlayStation consoles, may not be on PlayStation consoles.
It didn’t work well for Microsoft to say that Sony would continue to bring Call of Duty to PlayStation platforms for 10 years for Sony’s withdrawal. In my opinion, the prominence of Call of Duty games on the tip of the iceberg was only put forward as an example. The possibility that Activision-Blizzard will lose other titles may push Sony from its position as the leading console manufacturer to the bottom of the list.
Call of Duty lies at the center of the Microsoft-Sony war
Who would want to be in such a situation? Especially when it comes to billions of dollars… At this point, Sony has turned to try legal ways, which is the only trump card it has. However, the fact that Microsoft has managed to win the hearts of players, especially with Xbox Game Pass, has caused things to backfire a little on Sony’s side. After all, there is no PlayStation brand as strong as it was in the PS4 time. With the effect of the pandemic, it is experiencing regressions in terms of both devices and accessories.
In addition, when Sony brought the games identified with the concept of “exclusive” in the industry and then released them on PC, cracks began to be experienced in its main audience. Because they were promised that only they could play console-specific games. We have always seen similar situations in the comments to Merlin’s Cauldron. In the verbal discussions between the fans of the two consoles, the Sony side said, “You don’t even have Uncharted,” but the Microsoft side could not find a game to bring it up. Although productions such as “Halo” are sometimes suggested, a much better production, Call of Duty, already existed on PlayStation consoles.
What will happen now?
At this point, I think both companies lost in this case. Microsoft lost the case and Sony lost a huge fan base. Of course, Microsoft will not give up on this so easily. However, at this stage, it seems that things will not go as fast as he wants and he will give Sony time to make new moves.
In order for Microsoft to achieve the position it wants to reach, it also needs to make many new announcements. Likewise, Sony needs to take steps to create new content specific to the platform and to regain its old audience in order to maintain its position.
Microsoft took the first step and announced that it will hold a Showcase on June 11. This event, which coincides with E3 time, will be a showcase where the company will play all its cards. Although we will get a lot of details about the long-awaited productions like Starfield, I believe that Microsoft will make a much bigger announcement to impress the players.
On the other hand, on the Sony front, it is stated that a bigger event than the State of Play and Showcases that have taken place in recent months will be organized by PlayStation. However, in my opinion, showing content such as PlayStation 5 Pro or Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 at this event will not be enough to satisfy me, at least. In order for Sony to regain its old reputation and strengthen its position, it is necessary to make a series of statements that are completely innovative like Microsoft and that will bring the excitement of the players to the top. Because it still doesn’t have enough or a title that excites me for PS5 yet.
Players Will Win
The growing competition between the two companies will be beneficial for us. Both companies, especially with the competition like PS3 and X360 time, will bring the IPs announced one after another. We will see how true these are after the events to be held in June.