Microsoft Inks Nvidia Game Deal To Assuage Regulators Over Activision Merger (reuters.com) 18
"Microsoft has struck a 10-year deal to bring "Call of Duty" and other Activision games to Nvidia's gaming platform, if the Xbox maker is allowed to complete its much-contested $69 billion acquisition of Activision," reports Reuters. It comes hot on the heels of a 10-year deal with Nintendo that guarantees Nintendo players will get Activision games on the same day as Xbox, with full feature and content parity. Reuters reports: Regulators and competitors like Sony have come out hard against the proposed Microsoft-Activision tie-up, and a Nvidia deal could allay concerns by ensuring more ways for consumers to get games controlled by Microsoft. [...] Microsoft President Brad Smith told a news conference on Tuesday he was now more optimistic of getting the Activision acquisition done after the Nvidia deal and a similar arrangement with Nintendo.
Phil Eisler, vice president and general manager of Nvidia's GeForce Now segment, said that titles such that "Call of Duty" will not be available on Nvidia's service unless Microsoft acquires Activision but that other Microsoft-owned titles such as "Minecraft" are covered immediately under the 10-year license agreement. "We were a little concerned about it at the beginning," Eisler said of the Microsoft-Activision deal. "But then we reached out to Microsoft, and they were very open about wanting to enable cloud gaming and work with us on a 10-year license agreement. So over time, they made us more and more comfortable with it."
Eisler said Nvidia is not paying Microsoft for access to the titles, which has been the chip company's practice with other gaming companies such as "Fortnite" maker Epic Games. Instead, Nvidia's 25 million customers will need to pay Nvidia for access to its cloud gaming platform and pay Microsoft for its games. Nvidia said it now supports the Xbox maker's bid to purchase Activision, but the deal could still be a hard sell with regulators. Smith said he hoped that rival Sony will consider doing the same type of deal with Nvidia.
Phil Eisler, vice president and general manager of Nvidia's GeForce Now segment, said that titles such that "Call of Duty" will not be available on Nvidia's service unless Microsoft acquires Activision but that other Microsoft-owned titles such as "Minecraft" are covered immediately under the 10-year license agreement. "We were a little concerned about it at the beginning," Eisler said of the Microsoft-Activision deal. "But then we reached out to Microsoft, and they were very open about wanting to enable cloud gaming and work with us on a 10-year license agreement. So over time, they made us more and more comfortable with it."
Eisler said Nvidia is not paying Microsoft for access to the titles, which has been the chip company's practice with other gaming companies such as "Fortnite" maker Epic Games. Instead, Nvidia's 25 million customers will need to pay Nvidia for access to its cloud gaming platform and pay Microsoft for its games. Nvidia said it now supports the Xbox maker's bid to purchase Activision, but the deal could still be a hard sell with regulators. Smith said he hoped that rival Sony will consider doing the same type of deal with Nvidia.
Still doesn't really help the general industry (Score:4, Insightful)
Microsoft is hedging the argument by hitting previously non-competitors, instead of their big competitor.
The reality is anti-trust laws need to be revised to separate platform from offerings-on-platform in tech.
If you have a platform, you shouldn't be able to ALSo sell things on that platform. Split the company. It removes conflicts of interest.
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Or demand some kind of federated layer between the game and what it runs on. Boils my blood thinking about the situation on the PC where you have Epic, Origin, UPlay, Steam, XBox, GOG, Battle.Net, plus enumerable other launchers / stores all bloating out the computer. All of them do the same thing - launch games, provide achievements & updates. But everyone wants the cake to themselves so the game, the services and the store are all locked in together. It's bad enough for consumers who have gigabytes of
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Um... (Score:3)
...What gaming platform would this be, then?
And no, GeForce Now is not a platform. It's a launcher and settings manager. Windows is the platform...
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GeForce Now is not a platform. It's a launcher and settings manager. Windows is the platform...
You can get GeForce now on a lowly Shield Tube (though I suggest getting a real one just to get USB ports.)
Re: Um... (Score:2)
A 10 year deal (Score:4, Insightful)
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Then after that consumers get screwed for the next 50+ years.
That's true, and I agree completely. But that's only because consumers have proven to Microsoft (and everyone else) for decades that they will not act in their own best long-term interests. It would be in game players' best interests to seek out and buy independent games so smaller (even startup) game studios can flourish.
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for a future vision of Socialist mediocrity.
Damn, it is "Socialist", but I meant to use the term "Liberal", as in American Liberal (neo-Fascist) or Classical Liberalism (Libertarianism)...
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Worse people need to think of it in terms of modern game development times. A 10 year deal could very easily be a single game release.
What we want (Score:2)
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