Game News Call of Duty: Sony is afraid of the advantages that Xbox versions of CoD games could have, and makes it known!
Decidedly, the battle between Sony and Microsoft since the announcement of the takeover of Activision-Blizzard by the latter is raging. Today again, Jim Ryan, the director of Sony Interactive Entertainment, expressed his fears to the British competition authority.
Call of Duty at the center of a war!
As you may already know, Microsoft is currently in talks with authorities in various countries to obtain approval to acquire Activision-Blizzard, a $68.7 billion takeover that has been announced at the beginning of the year. Since then, things have been progressing slowly, but surely, it must be said that Jim Ryan is taking pains to slow down the process. After going to meet the European Commission earlier this month, the director of Sony Interactive Entertainment has expressed his fears to the British competition authority.
Indeed, after having declared in the columns of The Verge last September that Microsoft is making an “in many respects inadequate” deal regarding the future of the Call of Duty saga on PlayStation, the thinking head of the PlayStation brand comes today to express his fears that the Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S versions will leave with some advantages over the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 mounts, such as technical improvements or additional content. For Sony, it’s unfair, since these bonuses will push players to desert the PlayStation versions in favor of the Xbox versions.
Players can expect Call of Duty on Xbox to feature additional content and improved compatibility with console hardware, in addition to the benefits of Xbox Game Pass membership. These factors are likely to influence gamers’ choice of console. Sony, to the UK competition authority
In other words, the PlayStation brand is trying somehow to prohibit Microsoft from offering exclusive content to its players in order to favor this or that machine. A rather surprising argument especially when we know that Sony has been depriving Xbox players of game modes like Onslaught for many years now. Call of Duty : Black Ops Cold War which was exclusive to PlayStation for a period of 12 months or the Operator packs of Call of Duty : Modern Warfare 2 (2022) which are once again reserved for PlayStation gamers.
Already a battle won for PlayStation?
If we recently learned that an agreement stipulated that Call of Duty games will land on PlayStation machines for only three years, it seems that Microsoft has chosen to backtrack following the various reactions of Jim Ryan.
Recently, the American manufacturer declared that it had “no intention of taking Call of Duty out of the hands of gamers”, before adding that it would “tarnish the image of the Call of Duty and Xbox brands”. In other words, it’s already part of the battle won for Jim Ryan, at least if the Xbox brand keeps its word in the years to come.