After Microsoft bought Activision Blizzard with a lot of money, compared to Blizzard Entertainment, which Taiwanese players are more concerned about, the most heated discussion among European and American players is whether Activision’s signature shooting game “Call of Duty” will become an Xbox exclusive game in the future. Phil Spencer, head of Xbox, gave the answer today “no.”
Even if you only look at the annual sales within the PS platform, the “Decisive Moment” series has always been a constant winner in the European and American lists, and less than a year after Microsoft announced the acquisition of Bethesda, it also officially confirmed that the new work “Starfield” will be exclusive to Xbox and PC. , so it is not surprising that PS players in Europe and the United States will be worried that they will never be able to play “Decisive Moment” again.
Phil Spencer tweeted: “Had a great conversation with Sony’s top management this week, we are still adhering to our existing agreement after acquiring Activision Blizzard, and our desire to keep Call of Duty on PS, Sony. We are also an important part of the industry, and we value our relationship with each other.”
Had good calls this week with leaders at Sony. I confirmed our intent to honor all existing agreements upon acquisition of Activision Blizzard and our desire to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation. Sony is an important part of our industry, and we value our relationship.
— Phil Spencer (@XboxP3) January 20, 2022
With the sales of Call of Duty, an exclusive could indeed give Sony a serious blow. But if you look at Phil Spencer’s remarks and practices in the past, it is understandable. Phil Spencer has always hoped that home consoles and PCs will jointly make the cake bigger. Therefore, in terms of strategy, Xbox continues to close the gap with PCs and use Xbox Game Pass to make the pie bigger. The monthly fee mechanism to attract new players to invest.
Will do this primarily against growing mobile gaming (plus Microsoft’s fiasco in mobile), on the other hand against other tech, entertainment industries (like Netflix) because most people have limited entertainment time , naturally everyone will only want to pay for the option of investing more time. From this perspective, Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo and a major home game maker are allies.
But even so, the inevitable impact of this acquisition is still on the map of the “Decisive Moment” series in Europe and the United States. Even if it is not completely exclusive, Xbox still has many tricks, such as exclusive for a limited time, or direct entry on the first day of sale. The Xbox Game Pass lineup is an effective strategy for attracting players to switch platforms in the future.