Microsoft affirms in a recent document presented before the Administrative Council for Economic Defense (CADE) of Brazil for the review of the acquisition of Activision Blizzard that Sony pays for “blocking rights” so that some video games cannot be included in Xbox Game Pass (va The Verge). In the same document, the company has highlighted that “it will not be profitable” turn the saga Call of Duty into an Xbox and PC console exclusive because “it wouldn’t have any competitive impact.” Regarding the issue that concerns us in this news, the company states categorically that “the ability to continue expanding Game Pass has been hampered by Sony’s desire to inhibit such growth.”
“Sony pays for ‘blocking rights’ to prevent developers from adding content to Game Pass and other competing subscription services”, assures Microsoft. It should be noted that Sony could be paying for exclusive rights to its own subscription services or, as The Verge points out, the company could have clauses in some publishing contracts that prevent some games it publishes from being published on rival subscription services. . That yes, on the other hand, the cited medium recalls that this It would not be the first time that Sony has used economic incentives to block certain companies: During the PS4 epic, it is claimed that the company implemented for years a revenue quota for crossplay for publishers who would like to enable cross-play in their games.
Microsoft believes adding Activision Blizzard content to Xbox Game Pass will increase competition
In the same document, we can read that the company has highlighted that “the inclusion of Activision Blizzard content in Xbox Game Pass does not harm the ability of other players to compete in the market for digital game distribution.” The company argues that the addition of the Activision Blizzard titles will increase competition thanks to the “high-quality content at an immediate lower cost”.