Microsoft is buying Activision Blizzard, publisher of legendary games Candy Crush and Call of Duty, for 69 billion dollars. Brice N’Guessan, editorial director of Video Games Magazine, explained on Wednesday January 19 on franceinfo that“there was a real content battle” between the video game giants. The objective is “to have an extremely rich catalog”, car“they are in an extremely competitive market”. With the objective behind, the cloud, the possibility of playing games on any medium with only an internet connection.
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franceinfo: Why spend such a sum?
Brice N’Guessan : What has been happening for several years now is that there is a real content battle, no one will have missed it, as in all industries today, if we take the parallel with VOD, at Netflix, at Disney and at Canal. What they need is to have an extremely rich catalog. They are in an extremely competitive market. We have players like Nintendo, like PlayStation, who are present. To make a difference, especially Xbox versus PlayStation, because they have machines with quite similar architectures, it’s going to be on the content.
“When you have fairly similar machines, if you want to make a difference with your competitor, you have to offer other games.”
Brice N’Guessan, editorial director of Jeux Vidéo Magazineat franceinfo
Today we can play Candy Crush on all mediums. Is it possible that Microsoft reserves it for its subscribers?
This is precisely what worries a little the planet of the players for 24 hours. These are cult licenses, very large licenses. A game like Call of Duty, it is a game that is available on absolutely all platforms. Whether you have a PlayStation, Xbox or PC, you can play Call of Duty. The big question that everyone has been asking for 24 hours is: is Call of Duty will it be available on all platforms or will Microsoft reserve exclusivity for its Xbox ecosystem? The answer, we do not have. On the other hand, what we can say is that Xbox will perhaps not go on exclusivity. No doubt these games will still be available on all media. There is a precedent. In particular, the game Minecraft. Children and parents know. Minecraft, today it is a game that belongs to Xbox. And yet, it is available on all platforms because obviously there is a huge financial windfall. It is a game that is selling very well on PlayStation, but also on Nintendo. There would be no reason to say to ourselves: we are going to cut the floodgates and put this product Minecraft only on our ecosystem.
The trend is towards subscription to have access to unlimited games. Is this the future of the sector?
Xbox is working in this direction and this is where they can make a difference. Call of Duty, perhaps, will still be available on all platforms. On the other hand, a game Call of Duty if you buy it on PlayStation, it’s on average 70 euros. Today, Xbox has an offer called Game Pass. It is the possibility of accessing a library of 300 games for ten euros per month. The idea is that if tomorrow they put Call of Duty in their Game Pass, which is accessible for 10 euros per month and besides, you have to buy it for 70 euros on PlayStation, even though it is available everywhere, inevitably, players and consumers will ask themselves the question.
Is the physical medium slowly disappearing in favor of the unlimited subscription?
Exactly. And this is only the first brick. You need a rich catalog, a varied catalog. That’s why the acquisition of Activision Blizzard is shooting games, games for the family and games for kids.
“The future is the cloud. It’s the ability to play games on any medium. All you need is a screen and all of this will happen thanks to an internet connection.”
Brice N’Guessanat franceinfo
As long as you can play with this cloud technology, you don’t need to buy a console. Cloud technology will be available via your smartphone, via your connected television, via any medium that allows the use of a screen. If you take the three previous platforms Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo, it’s 300 million consoles. It is estimated today that there are 3 billion gamers in the world. That is to say, if you no longer have the barrier of the machine, then you can address the whole world. You no longer have a console dispatch distribution problem.