After a long and bitter dispute over Microsoft’s plan to buy Activision Blizzard, the two gaming giants have agreed to let PlayStation consoles continue to run the popular Call of Duty series. “We are pleased to announce that Microsoft and PlayStation have signed a binding agreement to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation following the acquisition of Activision Blizzard. We look forward to a future where players globally have more choice to play their favorite games,” Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer said in a tweet.
This came after a US appeals court rejected a request by the Federal Trade Commission to stop Microsoft’s $68.7 billion takeover of Activision Blizzard. The only significant regulator still opposed to the acquisition is the UK’s Markets and Competition Authority (CMA), but the agency and Microsoft recently agreed to pause their legal fight over the deal and try to reach a settlement.
For the unversed, Activision produces the top-selling Call of Duty series. Regulators worldwide had raised concerns about Microsoft’s dominance in the gaming market if it was allowed to buy Activision.
Microsoft makes the Xbox, which rivals Sony’s PlayStation, raising concerns that Microsoft would be able to limit games to its own consoles and push Sony out of the market.
Spencer did not reveal the details of Microsoft’s agreement with Sony, but some reports confirmed that it lasts for 10 years.
“From Day One of this acquisition, we’ve been committed to addressing the concerns of regulators, platform and game developers, and consumers,” Microsoft President and Vice Chair Brad Smith tweeted in response to Spencer’s post. “Even after we cross the finish line for this deal’s approval, we will remain focused on ensuring that Call of Duty remains available on more platforms and for more consumers than ever before.”
The CEO of Sony’s interactive entertainment division, Jim Ryan, also expressed concerns about the deal’s impact on competition as recently as last month. Ryan, who oversees PlayStation, said that he believed the planned Activision Blizzard purchase was bad for the market in recorded June testimony.
Microsoft initially proposed a 10-year deal to Sony to run Call of Duty on existing and upcoming PlayStation consoles at the end of last year, but the Japanese electronics giant rejected the offer then. To win over regulators, such as the FTC and CMA, Microsoft later signed a deal with Nintendo to bring the series to the company’s future consoles. It also reached agreements with cloud gaming providers like NVIDIA.
The post Microsoft and Sony collaborate to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation appeared first on Techlusive.
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