EU Approves Microsoft's $7.5 Billion Bethesda Acquisition (theverge.com) 27
The European Commission has approved Microsoft's $7.5 billion deal to acquire ZeniMax Media, the parent company of Doom and Fallout studio Bethesda Softworks. The Verge reports: Microsoft's deal has been approved by the EU without conditions, as it "does not raise serious doubts as to its compatibility with the common market." The acquisition required EU approval before Microsoft could finalize the Bethesda deal and bring future games to its Xbox Game Pass subscription. "The Commission concluded that the proposed acquisition would raise no competition concerns, given the combined entity's limited market position upstream and the presence of strong downstream competitors in the distribution of video games," says a European Commission statement. "The transaction was examined under the normal merger review procedure."
Once the deal is fully closed, Microsoft's list of first-party studios will jump to 23, following the addition of Bethesda sub-studios like Dishonored developer Arkane, Wolfenstein studio MachineGames, Doom maker id Software, and The Evil Within studio Tango Gameworks. Microsoft appears to be planning to keep Bethesda running separately, with its existing leadership. Microsoft originally announced its plans to acquire Bethesda in September, promising to honor PS5 exclusivity commitments for Deathloop and GhostWire: Tokyo. Games like The Elder Scrolls: Online will also "continue to be supported exactly as it was." How Microsoft handles future Bethesda titles will come down to a "case-by-case" basis, according to comments from Microsoft's gaming chief Phil Spencer in September.
Once the deal is fully closed, Microsoft's list of first-party studios will jump to 23, following the addition of Bethesda sub-studios like Dishonored developer Arkane, Wolfenstein studio MachineGames, Doom maker id Software, and The Evil Within studio Tango Gameworks. Microsoft appears to be planning to keep Bethesda running separately, with its existing leadership. Microsoft originally announced its plans to acquire Bethesda in September, promising to honor PS5 exclusivity commitments for Deathloop and GhostWire: Tokyo. Games like The Elder Scrolls: Online will also "continue to be supported exactly as it was." How Microsoft handles future Bethesda titles will come down to a "case-by-case" basis, according to comments from Microsoft's gaming chief Phil Spencer in September.
Re: Great (Score:3)
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Re: Great (Score:1)
dead (Score:5, Interesting)
As much as I hate to say it, Bethesda seems to have been going downhill for a number of years, they were already going in a Microsoftey direction.
The takeovers of inXile and Obsidian bothered me a lot more.
CD Projekt is dead.
Bioware's been dead.
Nintendo just had Post Malone cover Hootie and the Blowfish for the "Pokemon 25th anniversary concert".
Is the future of gaming really screechy preteen YouTube-celebrities yelling at Minecraft? This shit sucks.
Re: dead (Score:1)
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That way you tend to end up with garbage like Hollywood.
But just like thinking that thanks of Hollywood you can't enjoy a good story any more, the problem on your part is that you ignore all the possible novels from independent writers. Hence I'd
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No, they don't have to. In fact it is not a good business decision, as it leeds to worse games and worse branding. It is just idiots managers that comes with being a wealthier corp insist on dumb things like that.
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As much as I hate to say it, Bethesda seems to have been going downhill for a number of years, they were already going in a Microsoftey direction.
They dropped the ball a couple of times. But Fallout 4 was a good game, "Far Harbor" expansion was the best DLC since "The Shivering Isles", they've been having some success with ESO as they turned it around from a shitty MMO to a well received "Very Positive" rating on Steam.
Bethesda was always hit and miss - remember Redguard or Battlespire? But most of their games are great and packed full of content and exploration.
CD Projekt is dead.
Why? You release one buggy port (Cyberpunk runs fine on PC) and that makes you dead? In t
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My assessment of CDPR was based on the management and how they handled all the issues surrounding Cyberpunk. Unless they decapitate that leadership and sew a better head on, the problems will only get worse no matter how much talent is still there underneath. The criticisms that bother me with the game itself are more about cut content and the lack of "meat" in the game, not bugs. At some point, years from now when the bugs are gone, BTC has crashed and I have a raytracing card, and the game hits $30, I w
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My assessment of CDPR was based on the management and how they handled all the issues surrounding Cyberpunk
Yeah, that was a bit scummy. But I think they apologized enough about it.
I was also looking forward to Cyberpunk, but just like with No Mans Sky, I didn't let myself get carried away by the hype. Didn't preorder the game. Decided to wait it out. I have a full time job, and I'm a dad. I don't have a lot of free time. So if I'm going to invest 50+ hours playing some game, I want to play it in the best state possible. I don't see the need to play a game on release. I will wait until all the patches are out, ma
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Wow. Can I get you a prescription for anti-depressants?
Bethesda went downhill over a decade ago. They were basically an industry joke.
Obsidian's takeover is one that has had so far no measurable effect so maybe wait it out a bit until you get bothered about it.
CD Projekt Red had a flop of their own impatient making. Whoop de fucking do. That doesn't mean they are dead. Whether they are dead or not will depended on what they do going forward.
Bioware is very similar to Bethesda.
And Nintendo has done what you
Profit play for Game Pass (Score:2)
I agree. Bethesda's decisions to monetize mods, add digital currencies to their games, making them online service games that are launched in a broken state and are only built out after they release.
Microsoft's strategy with the $120/year Game Pass will probably require some kind of compensation for giving up profits on games that are put on the service. I mean, $120/year is just the price of two games, but people will be playing many more through the service. That $120/year doesn't go directly to Microsoft,
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Big budget games have the same risks and get limited in the same ways as big budget movies... The costs are so high that they can't afford to take risks on gameplay (hell, their risks are so high they have a hard time coming out with a stable product).
If you want innovation, the indie game scene is where it's at.
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Both Obsidian and inXile make PC CRPGs and I don't see that changing. Wasteland 3 has Linux, Mac, and PlayStation versions available and that game was released after Microsoft acquired them, but perhaps that was due to existing agreemen
Please please please fix the FO3 and FO:NV engines (Score:4, Interesting)
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They will fix it... when they re-release it so you can buy it again.
Money infusion (Score:2)
Microsoft's history with gaming studios have been a mix of hits and misses; but they had some really good hits.
Coalition for example built one of the best looking games last generation (Gears 5), and they are still actively supporting it with updates and new content.
Halo 4/5 was choppy, and Infinite got some early harsh feedback. But they are taking a year to polish stuff. That kind of delay requires massive financial backing, and seeing what happened with Bioware/Anthem, Microsoft letting 343 do this is ac
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Minecraft is a great game, but holy cow has Microsoft destroyed cross-platform compatibility. Seems like every two weeks or so they break something again and my kids can no longer play together on our LAN on their iPads. The old Java version, for all its quirks, "just worked" across all the platforms.
I think now it all requires an Xbox Live sign-in or something, and they can't even network their iPad version with the desktop computer version. There is zero technical reason for this - it is just willpower
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Halo 4 runs very well on my potato (FX8350/2xGTX950 AMP!/16GB/SATA SSD)
It just works! (Score:1)
Market Influence (Score:2)
We've known for years that Microsoft poured billions in to advertising campaigns for hardware companies that didn't provide comprehensive drivers for the GNU/Linux OS - just ask Greg Kroar-Hartman about the effort the community spent reverse-engineering drivers for sound cards for just one example
Humph (Score:1)
Elder Scrolls VI (Score:1)
Maybe this will help speed up the release of Elder Scrolls VI, long delayed and with a far greater gap than between Oblivion and Skyrim?