The Amazon model can't work for everyone because of the massive economy of scale it requires. Amazon loses money on Prime delivery services and some of their own brands but the sheer volume of transactions on the platform more than makes up for it, even at low margins. It's not a concept that Amazon created. They're following on to what Walmart did with brick and mortar and doing it online. When you get enough volume through your platform companies have to acquiesce or die.
Yeah, it's definitely not applicable for everyone but I do think it's applicable for software distribution though. Also suspect its viable for MS and possibly Sony but that might require a bit more information re the first part software rev (only get units iirc)
You as company can sell your own games in your own website or store, with your own rules.
As a rule, I agree with this take but MSFT spend $10b-$20b on marketing alone per year AFAIK, which I feel changes the situation for them specifically versus the general scenario for most.
Much like the MSFT model for xbox can only work for Amazon class companies, hence why this deal being approved would be as disastrous for the games industry as Amazon has been for brick and online retail IMHO, assuming out of necessity Nintendo and PlayStation didn't find a left of field solution to disarm the problem.
They would be real losses though, not low margins. The current studio budgets and business model for their games would lead to real losses. Their future GaaS games or partnering for lower budget games like Stray day one won't be.
Do Nintendo employ the best engineers that push the AAA space - like PlayStation and ACTIV do? No, of course they don't, because what cutting edge graphics programmer wants to work on Switch games as the only canvas for their talents? Answer: no one. So, there is not comparison, because PlayStation employs a very large contingent of the best of the best in the industry, meaning PlayStation cannot just do a handheld hybrid Nintendo. Their staff would all leave, because the work asked of them would be two generations below their ability.
Everything you said valid. I'm particularly talking about a government regulator requiring you to publish games on your competitors platform in perpetuity when said platform requires a fee to do so. Will Sony increase their fee to 35% in the future because of "inflation"? That's why short tern contracts have been the norm. Having the hand of government come down and say, "you must publish games for platforms that require fees forever" seems like over reach to me.
What?
so yoursying games like crash bandicoot won't be good on the switch?
Go ahead and name it. Which established franchise? Sure hope you won't say " Starfield " as it is NOT an established franchise
I can name one.
Crash at its best is way behind last gen game Sack Boy. So it is not AAA library, and not the main outlet of ACTIVI best AA staff that work on CoD.
What an idiotic take. Games aren't developed in 9months, in fact ACTIVI have three developers working out of sync so that they can hit the release cadence they do.
Maybe they should have been busy making their own games for 2 decades then. Sony know better than anyone how third parties can change allegiances, given that’s how they gain the market share when they first launched playstation.
For the individual game maybe but for the platform, maybe not
Not sure people are really defining it as altruism just highlighting that there is a difference in business model as you said
Ever heard of Elder Scrolls maybe?
Most of the comments I have read just highlight the fact that Sony does have an option here. It may not be an option that they like.
What if I told that currently before Microsoft even acquires Activision that they don't have to put their games on Playstation. As a matter of fact, unless there is a contract obligation they don't have to put any of their games on any platform they don't want to. That situation exist today. So much entitlement in this conversation about what possible could be taken away. 3rd party games aren't beholden to any platform.
Ok but how is this relevant to what we're discussing? Somebody said they didn’t remove any established franchises and mentioned Starfield is a new franchise completely oblivious about ES6. Nobody is discussing whether they are allowed to do it or not.
I agree. I think subscription services are a good way to build economy of scale. Amazon prime launched Amazon forward in a huge way. Not to mention that software in general has been moving to a subscription model steadily for the past decade to take advantage of the recurring revenue model. One time sales are becoming less desirable for software companies. If individual devs could figure out how to get people to pay monthly for games that aren't MMO's they would.
I have seen a lot of speculation, but I haven't seen anywhere that gave us a definitive answer on how long current deal runs
The whole discussion is centered around COD and whether it would eventually become exclusive if Microsoft were able to acquire Activision. The argument against is that COD similar to the games from Bethesda have traditionally been on multiple platforms. My response to that is simply 3rd party games aren't entitled to be on any platform.
www.techspot.com
Cool, but nobody is acting entitled. somebody made out this was good for the industry because "[MS] have yet to demonstrate this behavior with any established franchise that already existed on other platforms." when that was blatantly false. I say I can name one, he asked for the name, I named it. Now you are throwing this new thing at me about somebody acting entitled. Nobody is acting entitled to anything.
Pretty sure that came from GamesIndustry.biz and it was just their belief
I can't see FTC or EU demanding any concessions now. Not after Brazil went all in and destroyed Sony's rant. They'll probably see the acquisition the same as Brazil. I mean, why wouldn't they?
A game that is 4 years away and hasnt had an new installment since 2011??? Its been 11 years, can we try to list something a tad more recent? Im not sure that is the best example
And that is the crux of why no one in the PlayStation camp would ever want MSFT/Xbox to be the most successful in gaming.
Complete revisionist history if you don't think the PS1 hardware was the source of their original console success.
What changes when the acquisition goes through?
it is an established franchise though, that won't have had a new release for probably 16 years by the time the next game comes out. I think its stretch to list it. Give me a game that has had a new installment in the past 10 years. When its been that long there is no guarantee its going to release on specific platforms when its so long between games
You're being ridiculous. Does that mean GTA is no longer "an established franchise" because we haven't had a new one for 10yrs and we don't know how far out the next one is? You're just moving goal posts with absurdity instead of just admitting it's happened and you were wrong.
