UK regulator suggests removing Call of Duty from Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard acquisition | VGC

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The UK's CMA has published its provisional conclusion on Microsoft's proposed Activision Blizzard deal, and proposed that Call of Duty be removed from the acquisition.

and others preserves the deal’s benefits to gamers and developers and increases competition in the market.

Activision Blizzard said in its own statement: “These are provisional findings, which means the CMA sets forth its concerns in writing, and both parties have a chance to respond. In its provisional conclusion, The CMA claims that the proposed merger would have a negative impact on both the supply of cloud gaming services, and the supply of consoles.

“Reducing this competition between Microsoft and Sony could result in all gamers seeing higher prices, reduced range, lower quality, and worse service in gaming consoles over time.”

 

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Activision should just announce cod been cancelled if it’s the problem and make new ip to replace it

Xbox should remove call of duty from the deal and grab all the other ips and make them exclusives. And Activision should stop making deals with sony then the COD problem will also be solved 💯

I actually think this is a good comprises. COD can stay on other platforms for the forseeable future, and Microsoft can get all the other activison bizzard ips.

Amazing how you can lose credibility so fast. This tweet is fake news and is misleading.

After reading more info I realized your tweet is completely misleading and the situation is the opposite of what you implied. You lost credibility. Bye bye.

They should add in, 'no exclusive content locked behind specific platforms'.

I can’t believe that Sony can get away with keeping games of Microsoft but Microsoft gets punished if they try anything that Sony doesn’t like , the CMA is sony next Acquisition

That's what I been saying for months now, That Activision will have to sale Call of Duty like how Square Enix sold it's Western Studios..

Call of Duty cannot be “removed”. It is owned by Activision and therefore would go along with the sale to Microsoft.

What an stupid proposal from the CMA.

Why are so many outlets, including , getting this wrong? Removing COD is only one potential remedy. They also said they’re open to behaviorial remedies that include MS keeping COD. It’s just wild that so many games “journalists” don’t know how to be actual journalists.

Microsoft would probably make more money from Call of Duty by keeping it on Playstation instead of making it Xbox exclusive.

Something is missing...

Other inactive Activision IPs such as Shanghai (mahjong video game series often for Sunsoft), Guitar Hero and True Crime should be alive again, instead of actively such as Call of Duty. ActiBlizz is acquired by Microsoft make a popular franchise goes sold-off to other.

Seems like the Sony heads are doing some heads to avoid this stuff.

Good good. Microsoft should be stopped. They bought enough companies already and didn’t put them to any use but laying them off.

Hermano, que mierda?, Literalmente hizo monopolio por años Sony y ahora que Microsoft lo compra porque estaba en venta porque se estaba hundiendo literalmente ponen mil trabas, no entiendo una puta mierda, call of duty ya casi no abarcaba ni mierda como era en 2013-15

Area, dominates Schism' as it took

List of devices in which COD will be playable if ABK deal does NOT pass: -PS -Xbox -PC List of devices in which COD will be playable if ABK deal passes: -PS -Xbox -Nintendo -PC -Cloud (mobile) Is Microsoft really taking away options from players? Are you sure? 🥴

Well if it's true Ms never wanted call of duty

NOW THAT is proper bargaining! I was always for the micro/acti purchase. But to reach out for a middle ground? Like this? Perfect.

Fun fact. Hogwarts Sony exclusivity was so asinine. They couldn't put a single xbox logo or even a trailer on the Microsoft/Xbox marketplace. Creating an illusion to your average consumer that it only exist on Sony Platforms. Amazin'

So if they did remove it who would own it? Activision wouldnt exist anymore? I assume the CMA probably wants to give it to Sony lol

This is so stupid So what do they expect? 'Ye go ahead pay the 69 Billion, you just need to remove the studio that makes the biggest money in the acquisition' the fact they even propose something so ridiculous baffles me Stupid

This would be amazing. Remove COD from the deal, then since Activision wont be making anymore exclusive contracts with Sony, they can make them with Xbox. Win win!

This is stupid. If they have the money to buy it, why not? They've already said countless times that they wouldn't leave PlayStation gamers in the dark and would continue providing COD games for years to come

Fk CoD i want Starcraft and WoW on gamepass!

That separation is like saying “choose who you love more” because blizzard is the PC market, Activision is the console/IP market, and call of duty is the show runner IP with a large history.

OMG

Sony has also yet to respond to MS & FTC subpoena properly. Needing more time to cover up something 🤔

The CMA asking Microsoft to remove CoD from its acquisition deal is just bad. If you own and Xbox in any capacity, this is just straight up bad news. I would be interested in who they suggest buys the CoD IP regardless. The CMA seems to making this worse for the consumer.

It would be wild to see COD omitted from this deal and after all that, since COD would be up for sale, Sony buys COD.

Asw poor PlayStation, having to rely on a 3rd party multiplatform game to compete with Xbox.

everyone thought they would want concessions. now we are at that phase. let's see what deal they work out with the cma and eu. that's what they will go with at the ftc as well.

Victory✌️Gamers 💙 SONY

Sony is that scared and desperate they’ve cried and begged over one game. 🤣

Not gonna change the final outcome with cod and activison being owned by Microsoft

It's crazy that no matter how many times Phil Spencer has said COD won't be affected, It still falls on deaf ears to continue pushing the narrative.

PostUp_bbb

I want whatever they're smoking

How would that work because Activision own Call Of duty

joshscorcher Yup, getting what they deserve.. I think.

who tf would own the ip then?

Won’t happen - CoD will be 90% of the reason they’re buying ABK. The sale goes from 69b to about 20b without CoD!

Whatever the outcome of this is I'm gonna have content.

“could result in higher prices, fewer choices, or less innovation for UK gamers” Tbf, that was all in the cards for COD regardless

COD is not like it was before, I would prefer Sony to come back with Resistance, it has story, cooperative and multiplayer mode.

But Microsoft will fix Activision

Officially sony playstation are sobbing cowards they brag about sales and series with HBO but in the end they are what they have always been COWARDS hermenhulst KenKutaragi502 SonySantaMonica

Remember, its bad for the consumers

Please s.nadella send an army of lawyers to remind these UK's CMA sellouts of their true profession as regulators... PlayStation 😈💸World 🤮🤮🤮🤮 ActivisionBlizzard Microsoft XboxShare CallofDuty

LOL Good joke. No legal argument for this.

Activision removing their money maker might make them cancel the deal

Could harm Sony* lets be honest.

Just rename call of duty....

They need to just block the deal completely! Xbox already made Bethesda games Xbox exclusive now they are taking away the biggest gaming studios away from Sony as I said STUDIOS NOT JUST CALL OF DUTY! they need to invest more into their 1st party make better and more games

And that’s how lobbying works! Good job, Sony.

SKizzleAXE Microsoft and Activision may have to think about selling off the Call of Duty part of the business for the sale to be approved!! Who do you think would buy the Call of Duty business from them?

Remove every multi platform game then too.

Yes do it MS do it all other activision blizzard games exclusive and CoD be on PlayStation and Xbox 😝🤣

So no COD on game pass? Damn

'53% of boxed sales were on PS5, 18% on PS4 and 29% on Xbox. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is the third biggest physical release of the year, behind FIFA 22' - gamesindustry .....This is why Microsoft needs to buy A/B, but no thanks. You will no get my money....never.

Higher prices when Sony and Nintendo are already pushing for 80 euro games, logical enough

Lmao, what a fuckin joke

God job cma👍good day for game indrustry👌

Why not letting snoy buy them instead ?

The cma actually have no clue about the gaming market and this just proved it. There is plenty of reasons one could be against the aquisition, competition and cod isnt one of em

Had a feeling this would happen. Can see the compromise being CoD not being on Game Pass in the UK.

Microsoft already win by guaranteeing Activision IP on Game Pass. Nobody will be buying into Xbox for Crash or Spyro. Exclusives aren’t really an option here if they want profit

How they talking about price increases yet allowing price increases already happen lol

Dare to dream

😂😂😂؟؟؟؟

What about final fantasy? Spiderman? Temporaly exclusives thats where u forget the past and the present

Call of Duty is an over saturated franchise that put out games for 15 years straight. Idc if it goes exclusive I just want a Guitar Hero revival pls

ABK when they hear 'remove Call of Duty':

How is selling cod to another publisher going to be “beneficial” for the industry and consumers? MS is one of the largest and most accessible platforms on the market. The only place they don’t publish is PlayStation (which they’ve agreed to do)

Gotta love calling bs here. Cuz wow. Colteastwood made a good point about how Sony has been keeping games and content away from people. Call of duty had a whole mode exclusive to Sony for a year. You kidding me? A special edition Destiny ps4 and exclusive content. FOH

I would love to see Phil get mad over this because both him and ms has said the reason they were purchasing activision was for candy crush

No not going to happen Sony need to stop crying and deal with it

Sony buying out the CMA like it was Square Enix, FromSoft & Avalanche Studios.

Oooof 💀

Why won’t they just let Xbox destroy CoD?

without cod activision ain’t worth 68 billion

Watch cod cost 100 basic version on sony

It's all about candy crush.

Great day for gamers

lol.

lol. imagine putting that much value on a dying franchise.

Is it possible to do a lawsuits against them and Sony? Because the link is obvious, the arguments are joke, I loved the way they said poor people that can't afford an expensive console don't have the right to get a game with the help of cloud gaming.. what a joke 🤪

This should be an easy fix since Microsoft says the deal is not about COD to just sell it off and keep Activision and Blizzard for all the ip they can bring to mobile. Blizzard by itself is a shit deal especially after everything that happened with Netease

Should be no problem. Microsoft is aiming more at candy Crush. Not COD. Right? Tho I hope Sony would buy crash Bandicoot license back

Just skip UK all together

Burger without meat

Also remove the acquisition Crash Bandicoot and Spyro

Patético.

Sony can block games from other platforns and buy anything they want, but when Microsoft wants to do the same, fanboys come crying and Jim Ryan bribes institutions to block the deals. Hypocrites.

Just take COD off gamepass and that would possibly work

Well I DONT PLAY COD, so for ME this is great, it would let all the cod studios free to do other things, but yeah it's too much money to give up

LOL,the entire aquisiton form M$ was to have COD exclusive on their platform

🤣🤣🤣🤣 Sure Sure Sure

Sell COD to Sony

MS instead of making good games, trying to buy other companies to ruin them as well as Halo.

Call of Duty being renamed in 3, 2, 1...

In that case they should ensure COD for all platforms indefinitely vs the possibility to get COD on Gamepass for xbox users

🤡🤡🤡🤡

corrupt cma

Sony can but 1474643278 game studies including Bungie but Microsoft can't buy Activision. What a joke.

DOUBT! bobby is not about to split up the revenue of his income.

'higher prices, fewer choices and less innovation for UK gamers' that's unironically the same stuff Sony is doing lmao

Holy fuck I did not see that coming.

I feel that way too much importance is put upon COD, sure its a huge seller but let's not pretend that God of War hasn't already sold 11 million copies with the upcoming Spider-Man likely to match or even eclipse that

MuttaPupps ?

Protecting playstation is the priority here..consumers be damned.

So can they take the devs but not the IP of cod?take the devs and leave cod to die and use the devs to make a new fps ip

Funny they're worried about higher prices when they've already been raised there that's a cop out Secondly another report suggested they wanted call of duty excluded for the deal wins Microsoft just said 1 million times and people don't understand common English not leaving

Too many people are focusing on the PlayStation aspect of this. That's the much easier one to remedy. The cloud gaming one looks to be way more difficult to solve.

Won’t happened

Removing the biggest game would make the deal a 50billion deal not nearly 70

Ig this will be best thing....now MS can easily remove all other games from ABK from Sony barring COD(which they in my opinion would not have removed either).....

At some point if your Microsoft how much is too much now you're trying to exclude a certain game that Microsoft has said a million times over and over and over that they're not going to take off the PlayStation anyway that makes zero sense

Can't wait for the deal to go through

👀

That's what I been saying for months now, That Activision will have to sale Call of Duty like how Square Enix sold it's Western Studios

Personally, I don't care as long as the title is available for all platforms

It's not for them to pick and choose. This doesn't make any sense. Especially the section on cloud gaming. Let's also take a look at the diversity between profits and quality of first party games when comparing MS/Sony.

The deal would be pointless if cod isn't included

Fair enough. COD is ass anyway.

lmaoo thats wild

This aged poorly.

If that does happen if I were Microsoft I would say no more exclusive COD deals allowed if we can't own them. COD equal ground for everyone. No exclusive deals for DLC or anything for anyone.

Anybody remembers the CMA member that said something about removing COD from 'my playstation'? Guess what...

Microsoft and Activision won't allow it, but how would that even work? Microsoft already said it would keep CoD multi-Plat, so would they have to sell CoD somewhere else if this did happen

It’s over Rising_Thunder_

If that's the case MS shouldn't have to make anything multiplatform from Activision since COD is the only worry for Sony. COD stays multiplatform for everyone MS gets Activision.

I like how Europe and China think they are veto power over the merger of 2 US companies. That’s actually hilarious.

This is the right move Microsoft want mobile king more than call of duty only fanboys want Activision games for console war fan lists.

CraigHarris456

or Sony could stop crying about exclusivity while constantly paying developers to lock content to PlayStation? That's called exclusivity, guys... It's a competetive market, and Sony are only against that when it disadvantages them

Remove COD from the company that make COD.... really smart... noe who's going to maje the game? Or wtf they want?

We're about to get a lot of opinions from Twitter lawyers really soon LMAO 😂😂

If cod is removed is it just the ip or the teams as well. If so then they aren’t buying abk, they’d be buying parts of it. Which is dumb. CMA is a joke.

Well that’s another £70 the CMA have cost me every year. Cheers 👎🏼 ironically giving me less choice of games to play with my money🤦🏼‍♂️

It's sad that Microsoft wants ABK for Mobile but everyone is worried about cod

That should be ok with Microsoft seeing how they said this was all for mobile, am I right?

to think that sony is not involved or bribing the CMA, is to be very naive.

So they want Activision to seel rights of cod to accept the acquisition cause what Sony is doing since years will happen?

They are going to force them to sell call of duty to Tencent or Sony? Makes perfect sense…deal is dead.

It's no problem for me, they sell CoD to another publisher, what interests me about this acquisition is being able to play Crash, Spyro, Tony Hawk, Prototype and the rest of the countless ABK IPs in GP, ​​I don't even like it CoD anyway.

It seems like the most important factor here is COD. They deem COD as the asset that puts this deal over the anti-competitive line. Tbh, even if COD is removed, it would still be good for MSFT. OW, Diablo, WOW and King are extremely valuable assets.

Sad that such a mid franchise as cod is this important.

Another potential solution from the CMA is to hand over COD and Activision to PlayStation for a billion.

So basically, remove the literal only reason you want the deal in the first place🤣

arielsis

Yep, at the CMA, professional hard working adult gave that kind of response. I can't believe this is really what's being propose lol

So in a nutshell, the CMA wants COD and studios associated with it to be spun off from Activision Blizzard?

So that would make the deal somewhat pointless then

As part of its provisional conclusion in which it said that the acquisition “could result in higher prices, fewer choices, or less innovation for UK gamers”, the CMA has suggested that a “partial divestiture of Activision Blizzard” could be a potential solution.

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