
Microsoft interested in buying Warner Bros' gaming unit - dsavant
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-at-t-divestitutre-microsoft-idUSKBN2472LF
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boardwaalk
I don't trust Microsoft much at all, privacy-wise, Windows-wise or otherwise
not-being-evil-wise, but in my view, Warner Bros Interactive is the
combination of the bad elements of the film industry with the depressing
mediocrity of a second tier game developer/publisher.

But they bought and hollowed out the maker of the favorite online game of my
childhood, turning it into a mobile game developer, renegged on releasing the
server so the community could keep it going, and refused negotiations to sell
the IP, which is pretty worthless AFAICT.

So I may be biased. If this goes through, I need to figure out who to talk to
to see if we can recover it from whatever basement it's bit rotting in.

~~~
WorldMaker
It wouldn't be the first time Microsoft was involved with Asheron's Call, they
originally published it after all. Microsoft has a bad/unlucky track record
with MMO development/sales, but one of the better with handling the
consequences. Turbine was allowed to move on, to keep their IP, to continue to
be Turbine, when they exited their Microsoft partnership. The MMO Allegiance
_was_ open sourced by Microsoft and given to its community. I can't tell you
that Microsoft would 100% do the right thing if they bought WB Games Boston
and managed to get the Asheron's Call license with it (and that's a weird if,
because who knows what WB's deal with Standing Stone was; WB might not even
remember the way some of their licenses get lost), but I can tell you there's
a lot more hope than AT&T (WB) continuing to sit on it (if they are the ones
sitting on it).

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boardwaalk
One can only hope Microsoft would do a good thing. The saddest thing would be
if it was all just lost. I hadn't heard of Allegiance; that's interesting.

[Aside: I do wonder where all the relevant artifacts would be kept. Do they
have a vault with floor to ceiling shelving with all sorts of old stuff? Or is
it all in the "cloud"?]

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WorldMaker
If it is kept somewhere, it is likely still tape backups, which might indeed
just be in a nice library room collecting dust on shelves. Though these days
it might be "cloud" tape backups. (Most of the cloud providers offer "cold
storage" that is slow and expensive to retrieve when you need it back, as that
cold storage is just as likely to be tape backups and it takes time to
retrieve a tape from a shelf, unspool that tape, and read from it.)

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DevKoala
WB's gaming unit makes okay games that become successful due to the weight of
the media franchises in which they are based. You take Batman away from the
Arkham City games and you end up with a game not many people want to play. For
example, the Mad Max game was their best open world entry, but it failed to
reach sales expectations due to the lack of appeal of the media property.

I have no idea of what it takes to run a massive game studio like the one
Microsoft has, but I can judge their games output, and outside of Halo and
Forza, there is nothing for me there. I don't have much faith in them, and
this seems like the kind of bad opportunity they'd pursue.

~~~
gundmc
Disagree on the Arkham games. Arkham Asylum and Arkham City were fantastic
games with or without the Batman theme.

The free-flowing combat in Arkham Asylum inspired countless other games
including Shadow of Mordor.

I hate this as a potential acquisition because I hate the trend towards more
platform exclusives and this is definitely a move towards XBox/XCloud
exclusivity.

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munchbunny
Microsoft has been pretty clear on their direction of unified Xbox/PC gaming,
so in general I haven't been remotely as concerned about the exclusivity
problem. It would obviously be nice if it could also show up on PlayStation
and Switch, but I'm personally happy that Xbox games that would previously
have been console exclusives have been releasing as Xbox/PC games.

~~~
WorldMaker
Microsoft hasn't entirely been as clear about it, but there is a sense that
Microsoft sees Xbox as a services platform/cloud provider for _all_ consoles
more than a single console today (and Microsoft themselves are emphasizing
that with Series X it is definitely not a single console anymore and more of a
console family).

xCloud is likely to support every device that will have them. The current
focus is on Android, but Microsoft has been working hard to convince Apple to
let them have a first class XCloud experience on iOS, and there's rumors that
Microsoft is trying to sweeten the pot with strong macOS support by xCloud.

A bunch of Microsoft's Xbox "Exclusives" have quietly made their way to Switch
over the last few years, complete with Xbox Account signin, and lots of rumors
have been that Microsoft wants to heavily push Xbox as a cross-platform
multiplayer stack on Switch, to point where the _craziest_ rumors have been
that Microsoft was even trying to sweet talk Nintendo themselves in letting
them take over the gaming account system on Switch and leave Nintendo to core
competencies. (With the recent Nintendo Account hijacking issues, that may
even be a wise plan. Nintendo seem like they'd rather not be stewards of a
complicated account system if they could get away with it.)

In fears over Google's Stadia and nVidia's Cloud Gaming, Sony and Microsoft
even announced a shared xCloud infrastructure plan, with xCloud going to take
over some of PS Now's backend. That opens the _possibility_ , as wild as it
sounds, at this point that we might see more "Xbox Exclusive" games on
PlayStation at least via xCloud on PS, given that announcement. (And Microsoft
does have non-"Xbox Exclusive" games on PlayStation today, though that mostly
just means Minecraft right now.)

Again, almost all of that is scuttlebutt, rumors and rumors upon rumors, so it
is definitely not "clear" what if anything Microsoft is thinking here, but
"Xbox Exclusive" seems a lot more "flexible" than any of the other console
platforms, because Microsoft's idea of a platform has shifted a lot with
Azure.

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nimbius
First they paid an overwhelming fortune with minecraft after the userbase had
surely peaked, now warner after the DC universe and superhero genres in
general have become overheated to the point of consumer exhaustion.

Perhaps someone smarter than me can elaborate, but why is microsoft buying up
IP thats arguably crested by around four years?

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altano
The user base of Minecraft has skyrocketed to 126M monthly active players
([https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2020/05/18/minecraft-
connecting-...](https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2020/05/18/minecraft-connecting-
more-players-than-ever-before/)) so no, absolutely not.

~~~
magicnubs
200 million copies of Minecraft sold to date, with 126 million active players
each month? That seems almost impossible. It seems like that would mean that
even most of the people who bought the game years ago are still playing every
month.

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jarjoura
Oh good, Microsoft can spit out faster Halo and Gears of War spinoffs.

~~~
albatross13
#rekt

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qppo
Maybe they can resurrect Midway from whatever circle of hell it is where you
have to skin decades-old games with the latest branded content from your
Hollywood/demon overlords

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WorldMaker
My impression is that is what NetherRealm already is (and why their name is an
allusion to the hell described in their own games).

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excalibur
Only on Xbox Series X:

Mortal Kombat: Nuts & Bolts

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dyingkneepad
Mortal Kombat as an Xbox exclusive would kill the franchise for me :(

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Avicebron
Any remember Mixer?

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DevKoala
Seriously...

As a fan of Halo, I want them to support the Xbox forever, but as an investor,
I wish they'd stop.

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partiallypro
Why? Xbox is profitable. It wasn't 3 years ago, but it is now. Xbox Live is
important to Microsoft's cloud vision.

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DevKoala
That division’s revenue is declining YoY, and they are about to incur research
costs for the new hardware, and perhaps subsidies. It just seems hard to
believe for me that the opportunity cost is there, at least with their
approach.

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richliss
I'm amazed they don't use the development costs to make a desktop Surface like
the Mac Mini out of the Xbox Series X internals - may as well order more chips
and spread the cost.

~~~
WorldMaker
Xbox Devices is supposed to roll up to Panos Panay now too, so anything is
possible. It would not be a surprise if continued future alignment between
Xbox and Surface is already in the plans.

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mraza007
looks like Microsoft will be developing hitman game if this deal clears

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BlahGod420
Nooooooo

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techntoke
Microsoft cares so much about racism they going to be installing games by
default in their proprietary OS but won't include quality educational content.

