Microsoft wins FTC fight to buy Activision Blizzard : gaming

[-] PerfectedInterest@lemmy.world 122 points 11 months ago

The title is a little misleading. This ruling is only regarding the preliminary injunction. There is still an ongoing suit with the FTC and we will need to wait for that to be resolved. However, knowing how these things go, Microsoft will make a ton of promises about creating jobs, keeping their content available to everyone, and agreeing to play fair. They will get approval and immediately turn around and terminate a ton of jobs, start making things exclusive, and backtrack on their promises. Then…nothing will happen. There will be no repercussions. Rinse and repeat.

[-] SatouKazuma@lemmy.world 50 points 11 months ago

Thank the GOP for basically ridding the US of antitrust law, which is now basically no longer a thing.

[-] chungusam0ngus@iusearchlinux.fyi 18 points 11 months ago

contemporary democrats are not any better, they make hella frequent concessions to anti-competitive business practices under the guise of licensing or stimulus

[-] mojo@lemm.ee 15 points 11 months ago

This is why US democrats are considered center-right compared to the rest of the world.

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[-] Pelicanen@sopuli.xyz 6 points 11 months ago

Far from perfect? Yes. Bad? Very often. Not any better than Republicans when it comes to corporate interests? Absolutely not.

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[-] mojo@lemm.ee 12 points 11 months ago

The guys who claim capitalism works because a free market will create better things through competition. Guess they weren't so much for the competition stuff and just became puppets for corporations. We also have it completely legal to openly bribe politicians which makes zero fucking sense, except we call it lobbying so it somehow becomes okay.

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[-] someguy3@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago

I think they're still there, just haven't been trotted out in recent history. And mergers keep getting approved.

[-] SatouKazuma@lemmy.world 17 points 11 months ago

The last merger that got blocked was almost 50 years ago, I believe. So yeah...it's probably dead.

[-] burndown@sh.itjust.works 6 points 11 months ago

Which was that? Also, DraftKings and FanDuel got rejected about 10 years ago

[-] SatouKazuma@lemmy.world 7 points 11 months ago

I want to say it was in the telecoms industry. But I completely forgot about that merger you mentioned. Thanks for reminding me.

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[-] imaBEES@kbin.social 10 points 11 months ago

It's my understanding that Microsoft can now close the deal and acquire ABK before the FTC trial would even take place (as soon as July 18th, though unlikely given the new UK CMA negotiations). What happens to the suit if the merger is already complete?

[-] Defaced@lemmy.ml 9 points 11 months ago

Probably a fine that's simply justified as "operating costs". It's actually kinda bullshit, they shouldn't be allowed to buy up all the NA competition. Next is probably EA. Thankfully Sony saw this coming and started investing in new studios and IP.

[-] SatouKazuma@lemmy.world 10 points 11 months ago

How does one bring Teddy Roosevelt back from the grave? I'm uh...asking for a friend? Yeah. Let's go with that.

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[-] thoro@lemmy.ml 30 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Capital wins again. If only the FTC didn't sit on its ass for the last 40 years, maybe such market consolidation wouldn't be allowed and normalized.

Also shout-out to this comm. The Beehaw community seems delighted. You can sometimes really tell which instances skew toward leftists vs liberals

[-] HaiZhung@feddit.de 10 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

The fact that it was challenged at all is a huge step in the right direction. Couple of years ago, the FTC wouldn’t even bat an eye with these mergers. The new chair, Lina Khan seems to be determined to reduce the power of monopolies.

Which is a good thing, if this isn’t obvious.

The problem lies with the complete out of touch judges now.

[-] fruitywelsh@lemmy.ml 6 points 11 months ago

Oh no, those judged seem touched. Maybe the need another sponsored yaht trip to clear their heads.

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[-] Bobert@sh.itjust.works 24 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

You can "rah rah" about exclusivity all day long. What needs to be acknowledged is how huge this is in terms of developers under one company. As far as I can think of, there's never been anything like it. I don't think it's gonna be for the better, I mean this is the same company responsible for this

[-] MrFlamey@lemmy.world 13 points 11 months ago

GFWL was one of the worst attempts to compete with Steam I've ever seen, and also one of the worst software experiences I've ever had. I never got more than an hour into GTA4 because of it and how intolerant of bullshit software I am. Valve should have put their feet down back then and said "no secondary launcher dependencies".

Game pass is OK in terms of value if you play lots of games, but the software it uses is not great, despite being leagues better than GFWL. Windows also sucks, but I'm stuck with it due to work :/

[+] dontcarebear@lemmy.ml 23 points 11 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

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[-] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 25 points 11 months ago

At the end of the day, acquisitions are always bad for customers

[-] Redrum714@lemm.ee 6 points 11 months ago

This is one of the rare occasions where it’s a good thing. Activision has been a shit show for years. I have a lot more trust in Microsoft to run things.

[-] bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 11 points 11 months ago

Market share being consolidated among fewer companies in an industry is always bad for the consumers in that industry. If Activision was meant to go down, it should be through the mechanism of competition, not acquisition.

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[-] AnAnxiousCorgi@lemmy.reddeth.com 8 points 11 months ago

The enemy of my enemy is not my friend applies here I think. Kotick sucks and needs to be gone and I'm glad for that but I don't think this solution to that is much better long term for gamers and consumers.

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[-] Eggyhead@kbin.social 21 points 11 months ago

I might be a little more upset if I could remember the last activision blizzard game I felt was worth playing.

[-] mojo@lemm.ee 7 points 11 months ago

Overwatch 1 the first two years or so was pretty sick. Was definitely one of the most funs I've played. Now it's just skin shop with some maps to dress up in.

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[-] Saneless@lemmy.world 20 points 11 months ago

I'm all for this merger. Maybe Microsoft can use it as leverage against Sony to avoid needless exclusivity

[-] SatouKazuma@lemmy.world 44 points 11 months ago

This is a bad take. Any and all large corporate mergers are bad.

[-] Saneless@lemmy.world 7 points 11 months ago

My other stance is that Activision is so shitty to its workers and customers, let's give someone else a try

[-] st3ph3n@kbin.social 14 points 11 months ago

I just want to see Bobby Fucking Kotick gone.

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[-] SatouKazuma@lemmy.world 7 points 11 months ago

See, I agree with this angle, but at the same time it kind of feels like a Pyrrhic victory.

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[-] TheGod@lemmy.world 5 points 11 months ago

Microsoft gaming strategy does benefit gamers. Which counteracts the problem of losing a competitor.

Microsoft doesnt care about profits on single products much compared to the grand strategy they follow. For example AoE4 and all the aoe franchise doesnt really give a lot of profit Microsoft would care about, yet they keep investing and updating it bc they like it and like the strategic benefit.

Not caring as strictly about profit means you dont get as many greedy microtransactions and more balanced approaches. The game pass is also a really cheap deal if you play variety

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[-] MasterCelebrator@feddit.de 32 points 11 months ago

I expect this to make exclusivity even worse

[-] Shadow@lemmy.ca 21 points 11 months ago

Why? Microsoft hasnt been pushing for it like Sony has. Sony has been crazy anti competitive.

[-] EquipLordBritish@kbin.social 32 points 11 months ago

One company buying another is always anti-competitive. The literal definition of removing competition.

[-] Eggyhead@kbin.social 13 points 11 months ago

Future Bethesda games are exclusive. They weren’t going to be, but they are now.

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[-] imaBEES@kbin.social 10 points 11 months ago

Part of the problem is that since Sony is so heavily invested in exclusives, if Microsoft doesn't have any exclusives and all their games also come out of Playstation, that's incentive for people to purchase a PS5 over an Xbox because they know they'll get all of the games that both Sony and Microsoft make. So even if Microsoft doesn't want to do exclusives, they kind of have to if they want to keep people from just purchasing their competitor's console.

[-] Saneless@lemmy.world 4 points 11 months ago

Or they can be like me, just get a PC and if you really need a console, a cheap Xbox.

PC gaming is a plus and game pass is a plus. Sony will eventually give me their games. I've bought multiples of every Sony system in the US since the PS1 through the 4. But I'm done with them

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[-] verysoft@kbin.social 4 points 11 months ago

Xbox are not trying to sell consoles, they are trying to sell game pass.

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[-] dmmeyournudes@lemmy.world 16 points 11 months ago

I would love to hear how this could possibly make exclusivity better. The only possible change is that all of the ABK library becomes Xbox/PC exclusive.

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[-] NOT_RICK@lemmy.world 19 points 11 months ago

Seems like a foregone conclusion now that this will go through. Unless I’m mistaken, the only speed bump left is the UK CMA appeal in two weeks.

[-] Boogiepop@lemmy.world 14 points 11 months ago

The worst bit is, it seems like the CMA will negotiate with them. This might be well and truly over.

[-] NOT_RICK@lemmy.world 14 points 11 months ago

I’ll be shocked if it doesn’t go through. I stand to benefit from the acquisition as a GP subscriber but I’m definitely worried about corporate consolidation. At least Bobby Kotick will go away

[-] RedAggroBest@lemmy.world 5 points 11 months ago

This is one of the few corporate mergers I think could make things better because Blizzard is just THAT bad.

Plus this means the SC themed Halo clone I've wanted for the better part of 2 decades could be a thing.

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[-] mojo@lemm.ee 8 points 11 months ago

Well this is a good way to filter out how many Sony fanboys are here lol

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