Industry
Microsoft confirms 10-year Call of Duty offer on PlayStation
Microsoft's president assures that it would not be economically interesting for Microsoft to stop launching Call of Duty on PlayStation consoles.
During all these months since the announcement of the attempted purchase of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft, one thing has become clear: Call of Duty is the main obstacle placed by Sony for this acquisition to be completed. The Japanese company, with Jim Ryan at the helm, are aware of this brand's important role in the current market, with millions of players all over the world -with the consequent huge profits-, so they are putting all possible hurdles to prevent this operation from being carried out.
Microsoft, for its part, is launching counter-offers to convince Sony not to object to this purchase, and now we know, from the president of the Redmond company himself, the details of the latest offer launched: the commitment to launch Call of Duty on PlayStation over the next decade.
No intention of abandoning PlayStation... for the time being
It has been in an article written by Brad Smith himself in the Wall Street Journal that we have been able to know these details. "Sony has emerged as the loudest objector," Smith writes in that article. "It's as excited about this deal as Blockbuster was about the rise of Netflix. The main supposed potential anticompetitive risk Sony raises is that Microsoft would stop making Call of Dut’ available on the PlayStation. But that would be economically irrational."
"A vital part of Activision Blizzard’s ‘Call of Duty’ revenue comes from PlayStation game sales," Smith continues. Given the popularity of cross-play, it would also be disastrous to the Call of Duty franchise and Xbox itself, alienating millions of gamers."
"That’s why we’ve offered Sony a 10-year contract to make each new Call of Duty release available on PlayStation the same day it comes to Xbox. We are open to providing the same commitment to other platforms and making it legally enforceable by US, UK and EU regulators," he concludes.
However, we know that the offer is still insufficient for Sony, which wants nothing to do with being without one of the great titans of the industry, as became apparent a few weeks ago.
Source | Wall Street Journal