Xbox Owning Call Of Duty Won’t Be Unfair On PlayStation, Says EU

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It’s been over a year since Microsoft announced plans to acquire Activision Blizzard for around $70 billion, and the story is heating up. The story took an unexpected turn last month when the European Commission approved the deal while Britain’s CMA blocked it. The latter has now explained why it disagrees with the CMA’s view, and why there’s no reason to believe that Xbox owning the Call of Duty studio will give it an edge over PlayStation.

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In a speech this week, European Commission Vice-President Margrethe Vestager explained the reasons behind the approval (thanks, Eurogamer). Turning through hundreds of pages explaining all the details involved in that decision is wise, as it’s a daunting task that few people actually attempt.

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Related: Microsoft’s Acquisition of Activision Shouldn’t Be Backed

One of the biggest issues Vestager focused on was Call of Duty, a topic where European and British perspectives really converge. “I’ve heard that ‘Call of Duty’ is a very popular shooter series, but Microsoft is hurting itself by stopping selling ‘Call of Duty’ games to the much larger PlayStation player base. It turns out that it probably won’t,” explained Vestager.

16-EU Issues Objection Statement Over Microsoft Activision Merger

The executive also pointed to figures that show the PS5 has outperformed the Xbox Series X by a factor of four in recent months. By making Call of Duty his Xbox exclusive, there’s a good chance he’ll convince some die-hard fans to buy a new console, but Microsoft simply wants to leave the series as it is. It would be much more profitable to keep making games for PlayStation.

Xbox has indicated its intentions, and is about to agree a 10-year deal with PlayStation to keep Call of Duty games on their consoles for at least another 10 years. After PlayStation’s refusal, Xbox struck a similar deal with Nintendo in an attempt to prove it was serious and appease the CMA, European Commission, and various other commissions that had yet to approve the deal. It’s unclear exactly how Activision will run Call of Duty on Nintendo hardware.

Xbox has also committed to bringing Activision Blizzard games to its cloud platform and has struck various deals with nearly anyone who wants them. That’s what ultimately convinced the European Commission to approve the merger, which seems to be the bottleneck in the UK. The CMA believes that Xbox could dominate cloud gaming in the next few years if allowed to proceed with its proposed deal with Activision Blizzard. Microsoft has appealed the decision, but if the CMA sticks to its policy, the merger could be blocked for up to 10 years.

Next: I Wanted Cayde-6 Dead, But Now I’m So Glad He’s Alive

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