Activision Blizzard’s world has expanded from Azeroth to Pandaria, from the Dry Steppes of Sanctuary to Candy Kingdom. You’ve spent hours playing classic Blizzard games on PC, and Microsoft has potentially game-changing (literally) news for you: these vintage titles will soon be available in more formats and locations.
Microsoft now owns Overwatch, Call of Duty, and World of Warcraft. Here’s how the change might affect your favorite PC, console, and mobile games.
Microsoft Now Owns Activision Blizzard
On Friday the 13th, Microsoft’s $69 billion acquisition of gaming company Activision Blizzard was finalized, with the enormous game studio joining the Xbox team alongside popular franchises Call of Duty, Overwatch, and World of Warcraft.
“Today we begin a new chapter as we officially become a part of the Microsoft family, uniting with the amazing Xbox team and co-creating the future of gaming together,” Activision Blizzard stated on October 13.
“To the reapers, fighters, rogues, and airstrikes, I salute you.”Thank you from the bottom of our hearts, sharpshooters, revivers, healers, bubble bursters, Sorcerers, shamans, slayers, and survivors.”
It took a fantastic journey for Microsoft to get here in the first place. The acquisition, announced in January 2022, was met with opposition around the world, with regulators in the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom, and New Zealand concerned that it would lead to a lack of competition in the gaming sector, as it would place Microsoft among the top three video game publishers in the world, alongside Tencent and Sony.
This agreement will have a significant impact on Activision Blizzard and the games it develops, as well as the cloud-streaming subscription services that will gain access to those games and whether Sony and Nintendo will benefit from it. I’m here to explain what we know, what we don’t know yet, and what we can hope for.
Microsoft is a Major Mobile Player
Microsoft has never had a significant presence in the mobile gaming sector. While the console and PC businesses are massive, with $43 billion and $40 billion in revenue in 2023, respectively, the mobile gaming sector is much larger.
BREAKING: Microsoft completes Activision Blizzard acquisition, Call of Duty is now part of Xbox. After 20 months of regulatory battles, Microsoft’s giant $68.7 billion gaming deal is complete. Full details here 👉 https://t.co/iIqmWK5JVD pic.twitter.com/AR5tZ9g22o
— Tom Warren (@tomwarren) October 13, 2023
According to a survey conducted by data.ai and IDC, the segment will generate $103 billion this year alone. However, with the acquisition of Activision Blizzard, Microsoft has become one of the most important companies in mobile gaming. In the first half of 2023, Activision Blizzard’s “Candy Crush Saga” was the world’s second-highest-grossing mobile game, trailing only Tencent’s “Honor of Kings.”
Activision Blizzard’s King mobile division had 238 million monthly active users as of Q2 2023. That’s significantly more than Activision’s 92 million, despite the fact that that division is responsible for “Call of Duty” or Blizzard’s 26 million.
“The amount of revenue that ‘Candy Crush’ generates should not be underestimated,” said Will McKeon-White, senior analyst at Forrester. “Traditionally, Microsoft has had a minimal… mobile gaming presence.” So this acquisition also contributes considerably to that.”
Microsoft’s mobile presence also gives it a considerable advantage in the mobile advertising arena. After all, mobile apps make money through in-game purchases or advertisements, and “Candy Crush” does both.
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Activision Blizzard Games on Streaming Services
Another enormous promise Microsoft made when pushing through the acquisition was that it would bring the acquired games to streaming services, eliminating the need for you to buy physical copies of the games in favor of just downloading them right into your PC or console. There are already several possibilities.
First, Xbox has begun work on bringing gaming properties from Activision, Blizzard, and King to Xbox gaming Pass “and other platforms,” with an update on the process planned in the coming months.
Second, in an effort to avoid worries about creating an anti-competitive gaming market, Microsoft ceded cloud streaming rights for Activision Blizzard games to Ubisoft in August as part of a deal to have the transaction approved by the UK regulatory authorities.
The agreement with Ubisoft includes “perpetual cloud streaming rights for Call of Duty and all other current Activision Blizzard games and those released over the next 15 years,” according to a statement from Ubisoft on October 13. Ubisoft also has the right to license the games separately to third-party streaming providers.
Third, early this year, Microsoft reached a 10-year agreement with Nvidia to continue access to Xbox titles on the GeForce Now cloud gaming platform and to add Activision Blizzard games after the transaction was confirmed.
Finally, suppose you live in the European Economic Area. In that case, Microsoft is required to allow any cloud streaming service to free license Activision games so that users who own copies of those games can play them.
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