Microsoft’s ongoing battle against the US Federal Trade Commission for the acquisition of Activision Blizzard King brought to light how Sony wishes to release Final Fantasy VII and Silent Hill 2 as PlayStation exclusives. During Phase 2 of the investigation by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), Microsoft continues to face scrutiny for its acquisition, and Sony and Microsoft have responded to the CMA’s Issues Statement.
The complete document is available for viewing online, and the document focuses on how Microsoft aims to dispel competition and bring Activision games to their online services platforms like Xbox Game Pass and Xbox Cloud Gaming. They also wish to tap into mobile gaming, since the fastest-growing gaming platform currently is smartphones. They also claimed to not hold exclusivity to titles, and all platforms will get equal rights to the titles produced under their banner. This is where the light was focused on Sony.
According to page 64 of the document, Sony has ample successful first-party exclusive titles under their PlayStation banner, and they are also ranked as the best and fastest-selling titles worldwide. The paragraph also mentions that Sony has entered arrangements with third-party publishers, where it is required that these publishers exclude Xbox from using their platform to distribute their games. There was even mention of the game titles, which include the prominent Final Fantasy games, namely FFVII and the upcoming FFXVI, both from Square Enix. From Software’s Bloodborne and Bloober Team’s Silent Hill 2 Remastered were also named. While PlayStation gained 10-20% sales from exclusive game titles alone during 2018-2021, Xbox just earned 0-10% profit during the same years.
Microsoft continues to fight for the acquisition of Activision Blizzard King for the sole purpose of entering the mobile gaming market but has claimed to not withhold titles under the studio’s banner for personal gain.
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