Microsoft buying Activision (World of Warcraft, Call of Duty etc)

You dont spend $70 billion and then not make the entire catalogue exclusive to Xbox/PC...

Not bad for us PC gamers, but its ending the console wars one acquision at a time. Not a good thing.
 
To be honest; as Blizzard was primarily PC ANYWAY, then I suspect this won't be as detrimental as most believe; as part of thier projects were already PC exclusive/orientated. In fact, this could be a really good opportunity to get rid of the toxicity of Bobby Kotick and Blizzard-Activision management; and hopefully invest more in the actual software. I realise he is meant to be staying on intially as part of the deal; but I hope in the longer term, they all slowly get cleared out, unless they change thier attitudes and mindset; and focus on actually making games, rather than causing toxic controversy.
Hopefully this will allow Blizzard to actually focus on making video games again, and perhaps returning a little towards thier former glory. Activision was multiplatform; but I suspect at least for the mid-term, any projects already in development will still be multiplatform; it'll just be what happens in future.

Again; I really hope Microsoft turf out the toxic management; and use this as an opportunity to help the Activision-Blizzard group to do what they actually do well; make games.
 
Gamepass is going to be quite some platform soon in terms of the games on it. When you consider the IPs of MS, Activision, Blizzard, Bethesda and some EA games and soon some Ubisoft titles. Gamepass is going to be a no brainer in terms of the games on it. Theres going to be so many day one games for barely any cost at all
 
Yes, especially now in the newest beta on PC they've done away with the whole UWP hidden/locked installs, and the games are basically normal installs; Gamepass is actually becoming a very good value platform, especially at the reduced priced subscriptions available.

Yes, games come and go, they're not permanent; but this sort of 'Netflix' style gaming subscription has been a long time coming, given the dominance of the likes of Netflix in the movie/tv show streaming space.

I'm on a free trial now, and its giving me a lot of thoughts about signing up semi-permanently in future, as there is so much value in it; especially compared to spending say £50 on the likes of Back4Blood.
 
Yes, especially now in the newest beta on PC they've done away with the whole UWP hidden/locked installs, and the games are basically normal installs; Gamepass is actually becoming a very good value platform, especially at the reduced priced subscriptions available.

Are you using that client now? I didn't want to try it in beta, would rather wait for full release but if it's becoming more Steam-like, then that's great.
 
Are you using that client now? I didn't want to try it in beta, would rather wait for full release but if it's becoming more Steam-like, then that's great.

Yes I am; it still uses the Microsoft Store infrastructure, so sometimes installs/downloads get stuck as before and need to be restarted or don't want to install for god knows what reason; it also still doesn't handle big queues of games set to download overnight/parallel installs/parallel install and uninstalls that well, as it still seems to be essentially 'single target focused/single task bound' for example; but otherwise it works exactly as it says on the tin; games install in your chosen folder as normal game installs. Much preferable to me to the whole hidden/locked partitions and folders used previously; which could cause major issues with locked partitions/space etc if something went wrong or the Microsoft store registry etc messed up. It's a major step towards removing one of the major obstacles I had towards using Gamepass; and the beta has delivered in that regards. Yes, they still need to improve thier download/install system, but major step forwards. It's no steam in how well it works, and download speed etc, but it really is a big improvement.

And yes, this means we could see new RTS; given MS only just published Age of Empires 4; they now have the IP, knowledge, and teams to even lift the Warcraft or Starcraft franchise directly away from Blizzard if they feel they have another internal team that could do it greater justice; rather than the half ****ed cheap remaster/port thing that Warcraft 3 Reforged turned out to be.

Also means down the line they could also potentially take another shot at Movie or TV shows based on these franchises; as per the upcoming Fallout/Halo shows; one thing Blizzard always did was exceptional CGI (or thier partners).
 
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