Activision Blizzard has become such a huge pile of disgusting shit that people are quite tempted to see what would happen if the devil Microsoft buys it.
What a time to be alive
Yeah, never thought I’d live the day to see it but here we are. Blizzard use to be the darling of all gamers, only one who did things right and released games when they were actually done. Then money hungry shitheads took over.
I’m just happy to potentially see Bobby Kotick, Ion Hazzikostas, Mike Ybarra, etc ousted.
Don’t get me wrong. Fifteen years ago I would have flipped if Microsoft put in a bid to buy Vivendi and get their paws on Blizzard, after seeing how badly they ruined Rare. Activision tanked the brand so bad that I’m actually rooting for Microsoft.
I don’t think Kotick is at all certain to be kicked out. As easily as I can see MS letting him go with an enormous golden parachute, I can just as easily imagine them keeping him onboard because all they care about is Activision’s ability to make money.
In all likelihood Blizzard isn’t going to be managed any differently. Microsoft’s modus operandi with gaming acquisitions is to leave the leadership in place and let the dev/publisher run itself. Why is everyone expecting different here? The most likely outcome is MS does nothing to Blizzard and Blizzard continues on more or less the same trajectory as before.
Absolutely nothing.
Sad times for everyone that still believed in antitrust.
Trust = one or more independent organizations making secret agreements to mutual benefit.
Mergers: not a trust.
Monopoly = a single organization that controls an overwhelming amount of the market.
Microsoft buying a publisher that put out 2 games in 2023: not a monopoly.
How many times do they have to buy that 2 game publisher before they reach a monopoly?
How many of the last 10 games you bought were from Microsoft?
How many games game out this year? Thousands. There is absolutely zero possibility that MS or anyone else is anywhere near holding monopoly status on the production of entertainment software. Even if they bought EVERYTHING new creators would enter the space the very next day.
Honestly I’m okay with this one, but it’s mostly because Activision Blizzard has great IP with some seriously awful management … and Microsoft actually has been doing much better in that department for games.
Yeah… In practice, every time a company gets anything that even slightly resembles a captured market, they stop investing in quality and starting shafting consumers.
Make no mistake, that is Microsoft’s end game. And that’s why they’re buying Blizzard.
Luckily, Activision Blizzard already stopped investing in quality and started shafting customers quite a while back, so worst case scenario (in this particular case, your criticism is still valid for most others) nothing changes, best case scenario Microsoft actually cleans house and the market becomes slightly less anti-consumer with one of the worst offenders gone…
Microsoft even with Activision Blizzard would not have a captured market. Valve, Crytek, Sony (which now holds Bungie), Epic, Electronic Arts, CD Projekt Red, Take-Two, and Ubisoft are all still quite potent AAA capable studio just in the PC space … along with tons of independent studios (e.g., Ghost Ship Games, Shiro Games, Hello Games, Re-Logic).
The Microsoft internal doc leak said they’re mostly after King Games (mobile games) anyways. I’d wager at worst Microsoft will let the traditionally Activision & Blizzard studios do their things… at best they’ll clean up the executive teams and let the devs “play” a bit more with the IPs.
Mojang has flourished under Microsoft.
343 sucked under MS. Bethesda’s been underwhelming. Rare, meh. Lionhead, meh. Obsidian, meh.
Playground has been good, same with Doublefine. Ninja had Senua, which was good.
Pretty much a coin flip I’d say, but helped by the fact Blizzard has stunk out loud in recent years…change might be good.
The enshitification of Mojang has begun. Ridiculous privacy policies and bans in singleplayer. And the biggest introduction under MS was the engine rewrite, which was already underway when they were acquired.
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I mean, it’s had plenty of success with its own IP… Heard of Starfield? Minecraft … and it’s nth successful Spinoff? Forza Horizon 5? Sea of Thieves? Flight Simulator 40th Anniversary Edition? Age of Empires IV? Age of Empires XYZ DE? Fallout 76?
The only major “flop” I can think of that wasn’t corrected (at least so far) is Halo Infinite and … that largely seems to be a 343 issue. There’s also Redfall, but that was a new IP in an over saturated space … it’s not like they’ve stopped developing IPs, fixing games, and trying new things.
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Go look at Fallout 76’s reviews, it was unpopular at launch (IIRC) but it’s doing very well now … and that’s the point, they kept the lights on until the majority of players were happy.
Minecraft has had several games derived from it, that were entirely different games set in the Minecraft universe.
Microsoft bought Bethesda 3 years ago. To say that they had no ability to influence and/or didn’t take a risk on Starfield is … lazy at best.
And yes, they own Redfall as well, time will tell if they fix that one or it’s just a straight up failure.
Meh. A competitive monopoly has a better outcome than the near monopoly PS4 got when it came to exclusives. Yeah a lot of existing IP will be for one or the other. But for third party studios, they will be much less likely to make exclusive games if the console market is more balanced between the two. Nintendo is kind of in a world of its own. And with the steam deck helping push PC into a base level standard, I think we might see some opening up of high quality third party stuff.
Please I’m begging you just fire everyone who works at blizzard
The decisions made do not reflect what the developers want. Honestly, they’ve done a good job. Blizzard has just made them make shitty things. Technically they are good games, just not as an experience.
Warcraft reforged barely even functions compared to the original game that they ruined. The whole company is trash from the top to the bottom.
This is classic ignorant take of the average user that don’t know how corporate gaming industry works.
The “developers”, the actual engineers, don’t decide shit, some manager that only care for what the higher ups are telling them. And what the higher ups are telling is the same in all corporates: Increase the cash flow.
Overwatch 2 is great so it’s not all bad.
It’s fine, they already turned into shit.
Microsoft will make it worse but it’s easy to avoid this stuff, unlike Github.
I’d argue GitHub is one of those project they didn’t absolutely fuck up.
yet
Well, it’s been a few years already, and no enshitification yet.
They owned Minecraft for… 4? 5? years before enshitifying it. There is no time limit for enshitification.
True. I forgot about that since I haven’t played on public MP server fot quite a while now, usually just vanilla/modded with friends.
Please bring back Overwatch 1 the very next day.
Halo Watch
Will it then be MicrosoftActivisionBlizzatd?
Nah, it’s an acquisition, not a merger
So they’ll just call it Microsoft. Got it.
I know this isn’t a popular opinion but I’m actually pretty optimistic about this. Blizzard has been shit for a while and this will at least change things, even if it might be for the worse. Also give me their entire catalogue on gamepass pls.
Blizzard’s only game worth playing is HOTS and it’s a prime candidate for being trimmed out
But I don’t expect this to improve the rest of Blizzard
Diablo 4’s foundation is pretty good in my opinion.
There goes the competition.
Can someone recommend a good indie game? Better spent money than feeding these vampires.
If you like Diablo-likes, there’s…
- Grim Dawn (new expansion just announced)
- Last Epoch
- Warhammer 40k Inquisitor
- Chronicon (simple graphics but solid gameplay)
- PoE of course but I don’t need a second job
If you’re into metroidvanias (platformers where you gain abilities over the course of the game, expanding gameplay and allowing you to access new areas in earlier zones) there are lots of really good indie titles. Hollow Knight is the reference, both Ori games are awesome. Dead Cells is also worth a try if you’re into fast-paced action games, though it’s more of a platformer rogue-lite.
Just your luck: Dome Keeper is on sale right now
Lies of P
I’ve been loving BattleBit Remastered lately. It’s cheap, fun as hell, and the very small dev team has been very active and responsive. I bought 3 more copies to give to friends so we could squad up.
Baldur’s Gate 3 is amazing
I’m really enjoying Valheim lately. It’s similar to Minecraft in a lot of ways, but leans a little more into RPG elements with leveled skills. There’s a bit more of a story, heavier focus on combat, and NPCs to interact with (though I haven’t reached that point myself).
I’ve been playing a really fun indie spy deception game called Deceive Inc.
I just finished playing Cocoon. It was short-but-sweet - it took me two evenings to finish, so probably in the 5-7 hours range - but it was one of the most interesting and engaging puzzle games I’ve played in a long time. What’s especially fascinating to me is that its controls are so simple - everything is done with one analogue stick / WASD and a single interact button - and it’s a very linear game, yet it still feels so engaging to play. It’s from the lead designer of Limbo and Inside, so it has pedigree.
I played it via Game Pass (ha…) so it’s hard for me to say what the value proposition is like. It certainly isn’t going to give you the most time for your money, and it doesn’t really have much in the way of narrative or themes, at least beyond abstract ones. But it has a gorgeous aesthetic and some fantastic puzzles.
Terraria is pretty fun
Sea of Stars is a pretty fun, especially if you’re a fan of old school turn based jrpgs. Pretty decent story too.
Hades, Into the Breach
Lies of p if youre into fromsoft like games
And it’s even on Game Pass! Oh, wait…
I’ve been playing delta V: Rings of Saturn recently
Better spent money than feeding these vampires.
Just realizing corporations aren’t your friends? Anyways, if you like hard, unique puzzle games,
Baba Is Youis the best there is, fullstop.I mean, if we’re gonna namedrop completely unique indie darling difficult puzzles, then Return of the Obra Dinn also deserves a mention.
I’ve been meaning to play that, but still haven’t gotten to it! Maybe next week
I only care if MS makes blizz bring back OW1
Getting rid of Bobby Kotic would be priority number one if you ask me.
The problem is, even if they get rid of bobby kotick, he still wins. He is going to walk a way with millions of dollars in a separation agreement.
Let me dream of some clause in this contract which he breached and no one dared point it out. Ruined reputation or something.
Why do you want OW1 back?
Because I paid for it
I paid for Overwatch too but tbh I’d rather have Overwatch 2. There’s no loot box bullcrap and the playerbase now is actually pretty sizeable now compared to OW1 near the end.
I do miss the free rewards but they’re just cosmetics. A bigger playerbase is more beneficial to the game than more free skins.
One good thing to come of this (hopefully) is the chance to clear the C Suite people from AKB. I hope all of the AKB employees get what they deserve, which is a new set of higher ups that aren’t sexist dickbags.
Those c suite folks are about to make mega bank. This liquidity event will let them cash out all their stock options. I have experienced it.
That’s true, tolerating sexual assault is one of the few things dangerous to them.
AKB
What’s that K for?
King, who makes candy crush and other mobile games
I thought King was a subsidiary, rather than part of the parent company’s name. Has that changed?
King
I was done with Activision BEFORE Microsoft came along.
Not with a 100 foot pole. Get fukt Activision
Cool, can WoW be part of my Gamepass sub now? Thanks.
The logical question here is: will COD be in gamepass? otherwise what’s the point of this takeover.
Maybe they’ll make warzone no longer free to play but instead included in game pass as a means of recruiting more members.
I really do hope they get rid of Bobby.
The smallest of companies
