There has been plenty of talk regarding the latest acquisition deal from Microsoft. It’s been a long time coming now, but Microsoft has been pushing to secure the Activision Blizzard acquisition. This is something that’s been heavily reported online and speculated on regarding what the future may hold if this deal goes through. One component that doesn’t want to see this deal go through is Sony. They’ve been vocal against the purchase, and now regulators are still determining if it could happen in Microsoft’s favor.
Recently, Phil Spencer, the head of Xbox, spoke with Xbox On. During their interview, a conversation came up regarding Activision Blizzard. According to Phil Spencer, the focus initially for Xbox was to have a mobile presence. There is a far larger audience on mobile devices, and to tap into that market, they looked at Activision Blizzard. After Activision Blizzard acquired King, this made the company the largest mobile publisher outside of China. So it seems the initial plan was to flesh out Xbox’s brand on mobile games.
Of course, the largest IP within the deal is Call of Duty, and that had quite a bit of excitement in the gaming community. While Xbox supports were eager to see this deal go through and likely see these titles flood the Xbox Game Pass subscription service, PlayStation players might not have been keen on the idea. Since then, Xbox has put out contract deals to ensure that Call of Duty games continues to land on the PlayStation platform for years. These contracts also landed on Nintendo and Valve’s Steam platforms.
While Nintendo and Valve seemed to be fine with these deals, Sony is still hesitant to make this deal happen for Microsoft. Fortunately, Xbox On asked about exclusivity deals with Call of Duty, in which Phil Spencer was fast to shut down any thoughts regarding exclusive content landing on Xbox. Instead, there is still a push to ensure that these games land on as many players as possible. This means that the same quality and experience would be available not only on Xbox but also on Nintendo, PC, and PlayStation platforms.
There wouldn’t be any exclusive missions or skins that players would only find on Xbox platforms. That might be a relief for some players to hear. However, it’s still up to regulators right now to see if Microsoft can go through with its acquisition bid for the company.
