Nearly two years to the day that Microsoft announced that it would be buying Activision-Blizzard for $68.8 billion, the deal has been finalized. It's official: Microsoft now owns Crash Bandicoot, Diablo, Spyro the Dragon, Overwatch, Candy Crush, and many more. The acquisition was hotly contested by both the United States' Federal Trade Commission and United Kingdom's Competition and Markets Authority, but Microsoft altered the deal slightly, argued its case in court, and won. This deal solidifies Xbox as the third biggest gaming brand in the world, only behind Tencent and Sony.

According to Xbox's Phil Spencer, the next step is to bring many of Activision and Blizzard's game lineup to Xbox Game Pass.

Players have always been at the center of everything we do. And as we grow, we’ll continue to keep players at the heart of it all. We’ll continue to listen to your feedback, build a community where you can be yourself, where developers can do their best work, and continue to make really fun games. As promised, we will also continue to make more games available in more places – and that begins now by enabling cloud streaming providers and players to stream Activision Blizzard games in the European Economic Area, a commitment made to the European Commission. Today we start the work to bring beloved Activision, Blizzard, and King franchises to Game Pass and other platforms. We’ll share more about when you can expect to play in the coming months. We know you’re excited – and we are too.

Source

 

[The Catboy]

And sadly people forgot that this was all done to get people to forget about the sexual harassment :/
Anyways, can’t wait for Microsoft to ruin these games more than AB did. Never forget Rareware

 

[SkittleDash]

Was going to happen sooner or later.

 

[ZeroFX]

Eh.

 

[subcon959]

Everyone's a winner... well except for gamers.. but yay for everyone else.

 

[linuxares]

And Bobby is leaving! That's probably the only good news about this.

 

[squeakycleanswine]

As much as I want to tell myself this is a good thing, I really can't see them improving upon these already doomed franchises. Oh well.

 

[Viri]

And Bobby is leaving! That's probably the only good news about this.

Yes, and he's jumping for joy as he leaves. He's leaving as an almost billionaire, and gets to wash his hands of all ABK's issues. ABK's issues are no longer his, and now Microsoft's. Microsoft was a "god send" to him.

 

[linuxares]

Yes, and he's jumping for joy as he leaves. He's leaving as an almost billionaire, and gets to wash his hands of all ABK's issues. ABK's issues are no longer his, and now Microsoft's. Microsoft was a "god send" to him.

Yepp! Sure was! He is already as far as I know a billionaire. Since stocks.

 

[eduall]

,Bad news

 

[Xzi]

Good stuff, company was being mismanaged to hell and back. Maybe now we can get a proper WC3 remaster and/or WC4.

 

[DarkCoffe64]

Them companies can burn down to the ground for all I care, I'd just want a PC port of Crash Team Racing, thank you.

 

[KingVamp]

Hopefully regulators can actually flip this around to use against anymore buyouts. "You already bought this much."

Anyway, maybe we can get another Spyro game now. Also, I wonder how fast Nintendo can get COD.

 

[CMDreamer]

And sadly people forgot that this was all done to get people to forget about the sexual harassment :/
Anyways, can’t wait for Microsoft to ruin these games more than AB did. Never forget Rareware

Precisely my thinking.

Microsoft hands are a stomach.

 

[Nincompoopdo]

The first thing MS should do is - removed all Denuvo from Activision and Blizzard games.

 

[pustal]

And sadly people forgot that this was all done to get people to forget about the sexual harassment :/
Anyways, can’t wait for Microsoft to ruin these games more than AB did. Never forget Rareware

Ah, nah. That was what made AB want to sell but this was done for market consolidation and monopoly convergence.

This to remind ourselves folks that a deregulated market (or when you bypass regulations) tends to monopoly and therefore isn't truly free.

 

[ChaosEternal]

Never forget Rareware

I suspect a decent portion of this site's userbase wasn't born yet when Microsoft acquired them, lol.

 

[whitesword7]

And sadly people forgot that this was all done to get people to forget about the sexual harassment :/
Anyways, can’t wait for Microsoft to ruin these games more than AB did. Never forget Rareware

congrats to be able to convince yourself that all these effort and 70 billion dollar deal is done to make people forget about the harassment instead of you know, make more money?

 

[x65943]

I know it's ancient news, but M$ utterly destroying rare will always make me extremely suspicious of them acquiring studios

 

[CeeDee]

mr. microsoft. listen. i will forgive you of all your sins if you uncancel tony hawk 3+4