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Games Entertainment

Microsoft to Buy Vivendi Games Division? 456

Posted by timothy from the passive-voice dept.
Unknown Relic writes "While far from confirmed, it is reported that Microsoft is seriously looking into buying, or may have already bought, Vivendi's Games Division. For those who aren't aware, Vivendi owns several prominent gaming companies, including Valve and Blizzard! While no official announcements have been made, one is apparently expected soon. While this would doubtlessly be a great boon to Xbox's library, it could be a shock to other consoles as titles which were originally planned for a diverse release become Xbox exclusives."
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Microsoft to Buy Vivendi Games Division? More

Microsoft to Buy Vivendi Games Division?

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  • In case of Slashdotting (Score:3, Redundant)

    by tino_sup ( 460223 ) <tino_sup@aichohteeemayeell.com> on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:01PM (#5139583) Homepage Journal
    Microsoft Buys Vivendi? 9:40 AM - Andrew "Andy" Burnes - Game Biz.: General News - (119)
    Well I was sitting on the fence with regards to posting this earlier after I heard of this from various sources but now Computer & Video Games has posted the story. As the article mentions this would mean that Microsoft would control the publishing rights of Half-Life and this would certainly make the rumour of Half-Life 2 being Xbox exclusive more of a reality:

    If insider speculation is to be believed, Microsoft has bought US publisher Vivendi, with an announcement to that effect due soon. Take a deep breath and reflect on the implications of that, if true.

    Half-Life 2, Warcraft, Counter-Strike, Crash, Spyro, Lord of the Rings... Vivendi has an enormous portfolio boasting some of the biggest titles on all formats, and it would be an ultra-smart move on Microsoft's part to snap them up. Such a buyout, of course, would come at a terrifically high price, making the 365 million acquisition of Rare look like peanuts. But if anyone has the necessary funds, it's Microsoft.

    Furthermore, an email from Universal was accidentally sent out to developers last week stating that all work on GBA titles should be suspended. The email was promptly recalled and branded an error, but could it be that this was in some way tied in with this alleged deal?

    We contacted Vivendi for comment and a spokesperson told us: "We've heard all sorts of rumours over the past months - Activision, EA and many more. They'd all like to get their hands on Blizzard. I guess Microsoft are one of the few companies that has enough money."

    If this is true as various sectors of the press believe then we should be seeing an official announcement on Friday. So Microsoft now has its hands in Valve, Blizzard and others if this is true... Dark times or more security for developers considering Vivendi's habit of dropping underperforming studios?

    • Re:In case of Slashdotting (Score:5, Insightful)

      by AKnightCowboy ( 608632 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:29PM (#5139877)
      Talk about deja vu. I was just watching a documentary on trust-busting Teddy Roosevelt last night. Imagine my suprise when just around 100 years later we're coming back around to the same type of corporations that dominated the late 19th century. Huge trusts that are beyond the reach of the government whose CEOs are much more powerful than the President of the United States. They're huge monster behemoths who devour everything around them. Where is our modern day Teddy Roosevelt when you need him?

  • Oh crap.. (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Lord Kestrel ( 91395 )
    So much for linux releases of Counter-Strike server, or Mac versions of Diablo/Starcraft/Warcraft.

    • Re:Oh crap.. (Score:3, Interesting)

      by gregfortune ( 313889 )
      Exactly what I thought when I read the article... Blizzard has produced some wonderful games (been playing D2 *way* too long) and it would be a shame to lose the hope of them publishing cross platform versions. Hopefully Bioware can get their Linux client [bioware.com] for NWN out so I can break my D2 addiction. Until then, I send my thanks to the cool people developing wine.

      • Re:Oh crap.. (Score:4, Insightful)

        by KDan ( 90353 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:31PM (#5139895) Homepage
        Tip to break off the diablo2 addiction (I wasted most of two summers on it):

        Repeat after me:

        1) roaming episode5 and episode3 endlessly looking for eq is not fun
        2) there is no ultimate point to this game. Once you've figured out how to survive you need to figure out how to make big levels. Once you've figured out that to make big levels you need great eq, the whole game becomes a mechanical combing for quality eq. There's no fun in that.
        3) there are 100's of more worthwhile things to do with your time than killing mephisto again and again in hope that he'll pop some nice eq.
        4) When you finally realise the above 3 truths, you will be ashamed of having wasted so much of your precious time on this earth on such a worthless occupation. The amount of shame or anger you will feel is directly proportional to the time you will have wasted... so stop now!

        Daniel
        • what do you recommend for an evercrack addiciton?
    • Well at least they might finally fucking fix Steam and get Counter Strike 1.6 out there. *sigh*

    • Office? (Score:3, Informative)

      by freeweed ( 309734 )
      Doesn't Microsoft still produce the MS Office suite for Mac? And IE/OE? And a load of other products?

  • Microsoft not a monopoly? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by druiid ( 109068 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:02PM (#5139590)
    Well this makes the quote that Bill Gates said they couldn't be a monopoly because they weren't in the game console market as well, even more funny...
    • Exactly... the first thing I thought when I read this article was "here's yet more proof that microsoft is an abusive monopoly". What does Microsoft have to do to get stopped, buy up all the Starbucks?

      Worst case scenario, they buy up all the game devrs, Xbox sales start picking up while the other consoles drop, and Microsoft can go "we didn't force them out, we innovated! The people have chosen!"

      Whatever... it'll just be more incentive to get Xbox emulation working smoothly.

  • Vivendi does not own Valve (Score:5, Informative)

    by Schnapple ( 262314 ) <tomkiddNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:03PM (#5139600) Homepage
    Vivendi does not own Valve, Sierra published Half-Life and it stands to reason they'll publish whatever else Valve does, but they don't own them.
    • That's relieving... but it's very disturbing that they own Blizzard, though... I mean, these are two of the best damn game companies around. HL on one side, and the plethora of amazingly good Blizzard games on the other... hell, take Valve and leave us Blizzard, you evil Micro$oft bastards!!! :-P

      Daniel
      • How is Valve one of the best game companies? They made one game and then proceeded to rerelease it in about 5 different forms. Bah.

      • Vivendi - Blizzard - SDL - Sam Latinga (Score:5, Insightful)

        by SurfsUp ( 11523 ) on Thursday January 23, 2003 @12:09AM (#5141139)
        SDL is the cross-platform answer to DirectX, and its only serious competition. Blizzard employs Sam Latinga, who originally developed SDL and whose fulltime job is to continue to develop it. I find it hard to believe that Microsoft will allow Blizzard to continue to develop SDL by employing Sam, unless they are subjected to a serious amount of scrutiny about it. It is obviously in Blizzard's interest as a game company to support SDL, but that will certainly change if Microsoft controls them, and given that Microsoft has understandably not shown the slightest fear of trustbusters lately, I expect them to act fairly promptly to rid themselves of this little thorn.

    • Re:YES THEY DO (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Vivendi CEO Jean-René Fourtou has told shareholders that the company will undergo restructuring and that some parts of it will be sold off, but he has no intention of selling Vivendi's game divisions.

      Vivendi is in financial debt and company executives had previously stated that they were considering selling off their profitable gaming divisions, which include Blizzard and Valve.
    • Actually, it looks like Valve is hoping to do its publisihg internally (at least its online sales), with the advent of Steam [steampowered.com], their content delivery system. It's quite neat actually.
    • The thinking that they will/would publish any and all Valve games may not seem like such a big deal. A new content delivery system is in beta testing at Valve, called Steam (www.steampowered.com). It automatically downloads updates and even updates the servers running it. There is no longer a download link as it is running a lot of bandwidth and they have a sufficient number of testers. But this is straight from Valve to the consumer, bypassing Sierra and all other publishes. The one advantage of anyone that would buy the company that publishes Valve's games (and has Sierra signed an exclusive contract? what's to say they wouldn't change companies? id Software has done it before) is that they would be able to publish the game for their platform (ie, insuring that Half-Life or Team Fortress 2 gets on their system no matter what, even perhaps pressuring them not to release on other systems).

  • Uh-oh... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:03PM (#5139605)
    This means we'll see Commander Clippy on the battlefield in StarCraft II. :/
  • Since Blizzard currently provides the battle.net system for free, will Microsoft starting charging for the service as they charge for everything else.

  • This sucks (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Wraithlyn ( 133796 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:06PM (#5139639)
    Great. Now more PC games like Halo can be hijacked in a desperate to promote the X-Box.

  • I don't like this trend (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Billly Gates ( 198444 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:06PM (#5139644) Journal
    What will stop Microsoft from buying all or investing in the game companies to kill competition?

    I know they are desperate and only a year ago their was a total of 7 games for the xbox and that was it. They sell each unit at a $150 loss and are actually paying developers not to release games for the competition. Does anyone see a future monopoly here?

    Sega is gone and nintendo might be next. Sony will take a long time to kill but its possible ms can majorily harm it.

    Again it relates to Microsoft using money obtained from one monopoly and using it to crush competition in another which is illegal under the sherman anti trust act.

    What really sucks is the drm signed code that is required to run a game. This makes ms the gatekeeper. If they were smart they would make it free for anyone to write games for it and then use the signed code feature on the xbox-2.

    • Nintendo is not going away as long as they sell Gameboy and Pokemon related merchandise.

    • Re:I don't like this trend (Score:5, Insightful)

      by tshak ( 173364 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:19PM (#5139777) Homepage
      What will stop Microsoft from buying all or investing in the game companies to kill competition?

      Sony, Nintendo, etc. Not all game companies want to be bought, and Sony and Nintendo have done their fair share of game company buying as well.

      They sell each unit at a $150 loss

      First, it is not proven that MS loses that much (esp. now that prices on certain parts have dropped). I would assume that they lose a significant chunk, but this is offset by the XBox's larger than usual "attach" rate, which means it has the potential to profit a lot quicker then other consoles.

      and are actually paying developers not to release games for the competition.

      You mean like Nintendo does for the FF series, or like Sony does for the GTA series?
      Sega is gone and nintendo might be next.

      No, Sega is doing just fine. The purposely decided that they wanted to focus on software, not hardware. This was well before the XBox came out.

      Again it relates to Microsoft using money obtained from one monopoly and using it to crush competition in another which is illegal under the sherman anti trust act.

      This is a very poor interpretation of the law - it's a waste of time to even comment further.
      Sony is a megacorporation that has Billions to invest in it's gaming division too. It's a very fair playing field.

      What really sucks is the drm signed code that is required to run a game. This makes ms the gatekeeper.

      I don't really understand what you're saying. A console's gatekeeper is it's company. In some way shape or form, all PS2 and GC games do not allow anyone to write games for them. Consoles are proprietary, closed systems that require special license to develop for. What does DRM add to change this fact?
      • Not a bad post, but:

        > You mean like Nintendo does for the FF series?

        Nintendo pays who to not release what on who's console?

        Maybe you meant that Sony does for the FF series ...

        I still have to say that Microsoft is probably the closest (visible) company to abusing a monopoly.

        Sony is a megacorperation, but as far as I know, doesnt have upwards of 90% market share in any given market. MS does. People frequently seem to think that folks who take the monopoly argument are just saying it because MS is rich. It has nothing to do with their reserves, and everything to do with their market share in a particular market.

        Now, fair enough, they have to use their monopoly to be called on anti-competative behavior, not just the money they _make_ from the monopoly, but when 90% of games are made for your OS because 90% of OSes out there are Windows, then isn't making a Windows-based console an abuse of their market share in operating systems because they can leverage the existing non-choice most computer-game developers have in terms of what platform they develop towards? It seems to me that they have an unfair advantage in having people develop towards their console simply by virtue of their monopoly in the Desktop Operating System market.

        I'd like to hear what some folks think of that ..
    • If they're going to buy every game maker there is, that is a great incentive to start new such companies, with the guarantee that they will be bought at a good price. Microsofts costs will just rise and rise indefinitely if they try that.

    • Sega is gone and nintendo might be next
      Nintendo Isn't going anywhere. They have a lock on the portable market, and we know how many hundreds of games come out on those systems per day/month/year, all of which nintendo gets royalties on.
      Sony will take a long time to kill but its possible ms can majorily harm it.
      Nothing can kill The Sony, or the playstation, least of all Microsoft. Microsoft needs to prove it can sell more that 12 machines in Japan to get developer support, and it has not shown that in any way. Microsoft is an American company, and it's simply not going to make headway in Japan, when competing with your Sony and your Nintendos.
      Don't be so dire. Sega dropping out of hardware was probably a long time in coming. Nintendo has had only one real system which could be called a failure (Excluding Virtual Boy).
    • Again it relates to Microsoft using money obtained from one monopoly and using it to crush competition in another which is illegal under the sherman anti trust act.

      Umm.. No. That is NOT illegal. It is only illegal to leverage a monopoly in one area to crush competition in another area. As long as you are not leveraging the monopoly itself, you are free to use the money from the monopoly to do pretty much as you please.

      On the other hand, it would be illegal if they were to use the money (regardless of source) to buy up all the gaming companies and thus choke out the competition.

      Please educate yourself about what you are talking about before posting again.

    • Re:I don't like this trend (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Jace of Fuse! ( 72042 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:42PM (#5139976) Homepage
      Sega is gone and nintendo might be next.

      How do you figure?

      Nintendo is doing quite well. The Gamecube is profitable, albeit not as much as they would like. Their playign card business is pure profit. The Gameboy is pure profit. They generate revenue from franchise related merchandise they do not directly sell. The Pokemon franchise alone (love it or hate it) is worth more than the Grand Theft Auto franchise, and that's saying some amazing things.

      Nintendo is big. Nintendo is HUGE. Nintendo doesn't file "Bad Years". They don't file "losses". They file years where "we didn't make as much as we hoped."

      Anybody who thinks Nintendo is going somewhere apparently has no idea what is going on in the gaming industry.

      Oh, and the Gamecube is ahead of the XBox in sales worldwide, even if it is only closely "tied" or a bit behind in the US. Globally, Nintendo is kicking Microsoft square in the jimmy.

      I'm not knocking the XBox, because I like the platform just fine. But Microsoft fanboys that think the XBox is going to dominate need to give up waiting for the exodus to happen. It isn't going to.

      As for Microsoft buying companies, I don't care as long as they make good games. There certain is a lack of innovation in the game market lately, and Microsoft's subsidaries have a better track record of releasing non-shitty-shit than, say, either Electronic Arts or Acclaim.

      If Microsoft turns into another Shit-Game-Spewing company like Electronic Arts, then I just won't buy their shit. (And for the purpose of Shit-Games, Windows-Pack-Ins hardly count).
    • Others have corrected the original poster with respect to the comment that "Sega is gone." They exited the hardware market to develop software for other platforms. That said, it's been rumored that Microsoft has also been eyeing Sega for acquisition.

      I share the poster's concern though. It certainly seems like they're prepared to buy their way out of their situation, and it might well work in the long run. Technical specs ultimately don't mean that much - it's the software that sells a system. If they can lock down enough exclusives, they may eventually be able to take a bite out of Sony's position and drive Nintendo under in the bargain. I'm hopeful that Sony is a big enough gorilla to survive such an attack.

  • the $40 billion dollar spending spree begins (Score:5, Insightful)

    by havaloc ( 50551 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:07PM (#5139651) Homepage
    If this is true, this could indicate that Microsoft is ready to go on another spending spree and part with some of that $40 billion dollars. I suspect that they'll start buying companies up again, now that they've won/lost the anti-trust case. They waited a while for things to cool down, and now they are going to heat things up again as it were.

  • Sony=the new Netscape... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by pcx ( 72024 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:08PM (#5139656)
    Sony should terrify MS. The playstation is rapidly starting to evolve into the long awaited "computing appliance" and it doesn't run windows (tho it can run linux).

    You're darn right MS will lose billions on xbox and will use it's multi-billion dollar slush fund to line up as many key players on its court as possible because when game consoles start doing word processing and browsing the internet, guess who wants to the OS you use to do it?

    Buying vivindi and getting Blizzard (!!!!) and Valve and every fantasy MMORPG (present and near future including World of Warcraft, Eve, and MIDDLE EARTH ONLINE) that ISN'T everquest is just a perfect match from Microsoft's perspective.

  • Far from confirmed? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Wind_Walker ( 83965 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:08PM (#5139666) Homepage Journal
    Come on, people. This isn't anywhere CLOSE to being confirmed. One news site, which has a reputation for reporting anything, has declared an internal memo was leaked (and then rescinded) that declared GBA game production was to be halted. Thus, it's obvious that Microsoft has bought Vivendi, right?

    Rumors of buyouts have been swarming the gaming world recently. Nintendo will buy Sega. Microsoft will buy Sega. Nintendo will buy Capcom. EA will buy Capcom. Nintendo will buy Sega AND Capcom. Microsoft will buy Nintendo. Sony will buy General Electric (ok, so I just made that last one up). You get the idea.

    Please. Until you read about this from Microsoft, Vivendi, or on legit [gamespot.com] gaming [ign.com] sites [gamespy.com], assume that somebody made this crap up and are just looking for web traffic.

  • 'monopoly money'?
  • If this goes through, it will be a shame to see Blizzard's simultaneous Mac/PC releases become a thing of the past. After Steve Jobs all but declared war on MS at MWSF, no way in hell will Redmond put out Blizzard titles for OS X at the same time as Windows, if at all. This is a shame as Mac gamers are all too familiar with second rate status. Blizzard was one of the few companies (outside of a few porting houses and Mac publishers) who treat Mac gamers with some respect.
  • Well, it makes sense, and don't anybody go acting surprised. It's become a mantra that Xbox competitors have more games. A normal company would respond to that by trying to offer more games themselves, but MS doesn't have to play that way. They have the luxury of saying "Hey, we won't increase the number of Xbox titles--instead, we'll take some games away from PS2 and Nintendo. Sure, the customer loses, but Redmond wins!" Wow, I couldn't script a better villian!
  • Sure, you won't be seeing a ton of Linux-capable games coming out, but that's hardly the case now anyway. I have to say I love the idea of near-infinite funding for the development of great games, like those Blizzard has released, and I don't think every game that comes out will be Xbox only.

    I suppose it's more likely $Bill will take over and micromanage them into banality, but I'm ever the optimist. If he gives the clever folk who created games like Dungeon Keeper the time and money to keep the pipeline full, we could see some cool stuff coming our way real soon.

  • An obvious move if XBox is important to MS (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Tattva ( 53901 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:10PM (#5139694) Homepage Journal
    Really, this is something they should have done before even starting the X-Box. Time and again it has been shown that gaming consoles live and die by their exclusive content. A person doesn't typically buy a particular console and then think of some games s/he'd like to play; they hear of or see a game they must play and buy a console that is compatible with it. If only one console is compatible with a game, it will drive console sales if it is unique and popular.

    Given MS's abundant cash, the only real issue with this possible purchase is managerial: will it distract and divide MS management, resulting in lost focus? I think that is a real danger, but companies like GE seem to have successfully managed much more diverse portfolios.

  • noooo (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Edmund Blackadder ( 559735 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:12PM (#5139706)
    please God do not let the starcraft franchise fall into the hands of MS.

    They will probably turn starcraft into another era of age of empires.

  • Microsoft kills the gaming community... (Score:5, Funny)

    by EverStoned ( 620906 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:12PM (#5139713) Homepage
    "Vivendi, Viddi, Vicci".

  • Well this saves me alot of trouble... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by MrLint ( 519792 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:13PM (#5139718) Journal
    I did not purchase warcraft III [blizzard.com] because of the decisions [bnetd.org] made by vivendi/blizzard about bnetd [bnetd.org]. But if MS buys the Vivendi games group I wont have to worry about it as they wont be making anymore macintosh products anyway. If you dont get my reference, Bungie was making Halo for the macintosh and then they got borged by MS. Despite several promises of RSN [bungie.net].. well Its not coming from bungie and its certainly not on time [westlakeinteractive.com]
  • If you can't beat them,
    Buy them.

    Seriously though, this would be terrible
  • If some re$ources get put behind proper games (e.g. Blizzard) in time to fend off the onslaught of f*cking Sims and footbal titles from EA, that's a GOOD THING.

    Also, if a mysterious virus passed via game packaging suddenly wipes out the hordes of spotty drones who cluster around the whole shelves of EA Sims'n'Sports games at the local game store, that's an even BETTER THING.

    Give gaming back to the geeks! And yes, MS are geeks.
  • Not console games! Both mediums are entirely different. Trying to mix the two together would be a horrible mistake. I know Microsoft needs games, but come on, who the heck wants to play games that were designed for PCs? They just don't translate well at all. If they wanted to get more games for their XBox, they should be looking into buying Sega, Capcom, Square, Enix, or Konami who are experts and leaders in the console gaming business.

    If this does indeed happen, and it's for XBox games, then the console industry is on its way down like when the Atari/Intellivion systems blew it up. It just seems Microsoft has no idea what they're doing in the console industry at all. They're treating it like all games PC games are couch potato games, which they most certainly are NOT.

    • See subject.

      Viewsonic said, "Why would this be bad? Vivendi make **PC** games.Not console games! Both mediums are entirely different. Trying to mix the two together would be a horrible mistake. I know Microsoft needs games, but come on, who the heck wants to play games that were designed for PCs?"

      Mircosoft has done a really good job ignoring consumers and doing what they feel will be the best for their market share. While no one wants to play computer games for PCs, if Microsoft felt they could increase XBOX sales by releasing exlusives (which they probably could) do you honestly think they wouldn't do it?

      What's to stop them from releasing a "XBOX Commander" (like their failed PC RTS controller) and releasing Starcraft II as an XBOX exclusive? If they buy the company that makes the game, then nothing. They could even release a RTS game for the XBOX and just have crippled controls using the XBOX controller.

      "They're treating it like all games PC games are couch potato games, which they most certainly are NOT."

      That's the whole point. Personaly, I think console first person shooters are a crime against nature. Sniping with a controller? HA! Give me a mouse and a keyboard any day. (I know Microsoft is not the only one releasing FPS games on consoles.) The point is companies are ignorring the difference in the advantages of keyboard/mouse vs. controller, and the ability to 'fun-ly' play Diablo II on computer compared to Legend of Zelda on a console.

      Personally, I don't want to see the two cross over. I hope to Jebus this buyout won't happen, partially because I hate to see anything that gives Microsoft an advantage, but more because I think it will result in poor games. When you try to make a PC game for a console or a console game for a PC, the gamer usually ends up with the short end of the stick.

      -Trillian
  • At least I *think* it is. This is all just personal opinion so I might as well be pulling it out my ass.

    Every person I know with an Xbox owns a PC and plays CS. I'm trying to think of one Xbox owner that doesn't own a PC...

    Nope, out of the people I know can't think of any off hand.

    The Xbox only has 800k units in the US right? PS2 has like 2million. Can I think of any PS2 owners without a PC? Hmm, yea I can name about 6 or 7 off the top of my head. Mainly people under 12 or so.

    So with that in mind, why would MS restrict itself to the Xbox only? I don't think they would shoot themselves in the foot by excluding PC players, it's their biggest market right now, and it sells 2 products.

    Windows- Which only costs them the duplication costs of a CD
    The game- Self explanitory.

    Software will always be Infinetly cheaper to distribute than hardware, the Xbox is just a distraction from a DRM windows.

    • Every person I know with an Xbox owns a PC and plays CS. I'm trying to think of one Xbox owner that doesn't own a PC...
      Nope, out of the people I know can't think of any off hand.
      Can I think of any PS2 owners without a PC? Hmm, yea I can name about 6 or 7 off the top of my head. Mainly people under 12 or so.


      The demographic of Xbox owners is quite different to other games consoles. Apparently something like 50% of Xbox owners have broadband, compared to 5%? of the general population. They also have more money to buy games, as demonstrated by the huge attachment level for the Xbox.


      The Xbox only has 800k units in the US right? PS2 has like 2million.
      So with that in mind, why would MS restrict itself to the Xbox only? I don't think they would shoot themselves in the foot by excluding PC players, it's their biggest market right now, and it sells 2 products.


      Nope, Xbox has an installed base of almost 6million in the US, PS2 has a base of 21.5 million in the US.

      The problem with the PC market is that it's shrinking and that games can be released for linux so Microsoft would get no cash at all.
      Console games sales are much larger than PC sales, but the real prize Microsoft is after is subscriptions for online games and content.
  • This seems like a premature move on Microsoft's part. Sure, they have more money than Ft. Knox, and can buy whatever they want, but this is obviously to shore up the Xbox.

    What's more interesting is that this is a wildcard for Microsoft--they can buy these companies as a ploy to make people think they are shoring up the next generation of Xbox games, and then put out tons of (high quality) PC games, dominating a market that no one thought they wanted.

    Is Sony going to start buying up development now too? Has the rush on game developers begun?

  • Blessing for smaller developers (Score:5, Interesting)

    by bstadil ( 7110 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:26PM (#5139845) Homepage
    This is actually quite good as this will force Sony to put a lot of money into seeding/ development support for smaller players and start-ups.

    This could be the spark of some real creativity as a slew of ideas gets to be tried.

    A game franchise is only a franchise for so long. We need new franchises. There is 50Mu PS2's out there vs 8.3Mu for Xbox.

    This means that new idea can make money with a low penetration PS2, something that is not possible for Xbox. Say, 1% equates to half a million titles sold for the Sony camp or 80K for MS. Where would you put your bet?

    • This is actually quite good as this will force Sony to put a lot of money into seeding/ development support for smaller players and start-ups.

      Sorry, no. It takes 4-10 million dollars to develop a triple-A title, and 4 million is more like a figure from several years ago. If a "smaller player" has 4-10 million dollars, then by definition they're not a smaller player.

      This means that new idea can make money with a low penetration PS2, something that is not possible for Xbox. Say, 1% equates to half a million titles sold for the Sony camp or 80K for MS. Where would you put your bet?

      Ah, now this is a classic myth that has been the death of many a game development studio. The truth is that (roughly) 5% of the available games make up 90% of all games sold. If you're not in that 5%, then you're not going to see sales anywhere near 500,000. Even when there were 75 million PS1s out there, it was still common to see a decently reveiwed game sell 15 *thousand* copies or less. There are many PS2 games that are nowhere near the 50,000 mark.

      The big mistake is seeing that GTA3 sold 4 million copies, and thinking that your well-designed game can easily sell 10% of that. It isn't true.

  • Correlated to HL2 rumor? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Masem ( 1171 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:26PM (#5139852)
    As others have pointed out, it's Sierra that is under Vivendi. But there's been an interesting rumor on the gaming groups that Half-Life 2 will be initially an Xbox exclusive, with the PC/Mac versions to be released at a later time (eg, like Halo). This is simply a rumor on the net, but if this rumor on the byout is true, there's definite positives for MS and the XBox if they get this.

  • Does that means well see clippy in SC2? (Score:5, Funny)

    by haedesch ( 247543 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:29PM (#5139878) Homepage
    "Hey, It looks like you're trying to rush the Terran Base! Would you like help with that?"

  • They're perfect for each other. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by drivers ( 45076 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:30PM (#5139889)
    Considering Vivendi (being the owner of Blizzard) is suing the bnetd.org folks releasing their own open source reversed engineered replacement for battle.net (Blizzard's) servers, I think Vivendi and Microsoft ought to see eye to eye on most issues! I've been boycotting Blizzard for over a year now.

  • Microsoft: "Tsk-tsk" (Score:4, Funny)

    by abe ferlman ( 205607 ) <bgtrio@ya[ ].com ['hoo' in gap]> on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:34PM (#5139925) Homepage Journal
    We can't have Diablo III running under Winex now, can we?

    Buy 'em out, boys! (cue maniacal laughter)

    • Re:Microsoft: "Tsk-tsk" (Score:4, Funny)

      by swankypimp ( 542486 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @10:30PM (#5140669) Homepage
      On the bright side, Microsoft Word 2004 will replace Clippy The Office Assistant with Griswold the Blacksmith.

      Whoa! What cann'ah do for yah?
      -Get started Using Microsoft Word
      -Create a document
      -Insert a document as an embedded object
      -Run a macro
      -Destroy the soul-sucking evil that has invaded Tristram, then drive a jagged rock into your forehead

      =)

  • I've heard nothing within Microsoft Game Studios (Score:5, Interesting)

    by jordanda ( 160179 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @08:37PM (#5139940) Homepage
    If this is true then only a few people know about it. I work at Microsoft Game Studios and I haven't heard a thing. We just recently did some staffing changes in managment in order to manage Rare. We would have to do another huge re-org in order to absorb Vivendi. I've heard nothing along those lines. If we bought Vivendi then my team would have to double in size and haven't been told to do that.
  • maybe micros~1 will get Valve off their ass and make Half-Life 2 :P
  • "While this would doubtlessly be a great boon to Xbox's library, it could be a shock to other consoles as titles which were originally planned for a diverse release become Xbox exclusives."

    Why not? They did it to Bungie. Remember why Halo was going to be a multi-platform release?

    Triv
  • For those of you who are speculating about Nintendo being bought out--
    The Xbox is tanking in Japan. This is because Japanese are loyal to their own companies. Do you think for a moment a Japanese based company would sell out to American interests?

  • Idiots all around (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Archfeld ( 6757 )
    for confining ANY game to just one platform. I'd love to play Metroid Prime but I am NOT buying a gamecube for it, I would PAY $$'s for a PC version, but alas they do not want my money. Halo is another that I won't be spending money on, any number of racing titles, what happened to cross platform standards ? Any game publisher MORONIC enough to limit the audience for their product to one platform deserves just what they get.. Let's face it, I am an avid gamer with a budget of about 200$ monthly, and I CAN'T FIND A GAME WORTH BUYING.

    • Re:Idiots all around (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Fnord ( 1756 )
      So you're saying that a company like Nintendo, who owns their own console, and want's to make a great game (Metroid Prime) should make the game for systems they compete with? Really, thats kind of stupid. I can see where you might be upset about halo, because it was already in development for other systems by an independant developer, and MS bought them just to silence those ports. But nintendo themselves (or rather a second party being funded and overseen by nintendo) developed this game specifically to bolster their console. It would be stupid of them to do otherwise. Or do you think that console makers shouldn't also develop games? Thing is, some of the best games out there are developed by console makers because they know the hardware they're working on better than anything else.

      And metroid prime is one of the best games I've ever played and well worth a gamecube.

  • I'm not worried at all (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Y-Crate ( 540566 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @09:19PM (#5140199)
    *Sony or Nintendo buy game developer, make all its products exclusive to their respective console*

    Slashdot Crowd: "Oh, bummer. Anyway....."

    *Microsoft buys game developer. Makes all of its content exclusive to the Xbox*

    Slashdot Crowd: "OMG! Evil conspiracy! Even though Sony and Nintendo have bought out multitudes of companies and made countless games exclusive (which is what makes a console survive in the first place) the very fabric of morality must be dissolving as we speak!"

    Microsoft is only following the example set by their predecessors. Bitching at them more than you would bitch about another company doing the same thing is hypocritical and it severely weakens your argument.

    It really, really sucks when a game you desperately want to play is only coming to a console you do not have. That is, however, the very nature of the business and exlcusive content is what makes or breaks a console.

    I don't like business monoplies, I don't like to think that one company is attempting to control everything, but in this case I'm not worried.

    Why?

    There are two, very well-established and very skilled competitors who are trying to do the same thing. (though, Nintendo isn't so fierce). They are both using the same tactics, and they are both surviviing. I feel the pressure has made the industry better. There is now so much being put into getting the best hardware and the best games out there that the quality of the hardware/software lineup we are seeing now and will see in the future will be based on the struggle to not be left behind. A strong aversion to resting on one's laurels will pervade the console gaming industry.

    So, when people talk about Microsoft being a big, bad guy in the console gaming world, I just chuckle, knowing that the next Sony and Nintendo consoles will be that much better than they would be otherwise. The two companies have no choice.

    I for one, am glad the Xbox is here.

    PS2 and GameCube fans should be, too.

    Except when that game you wanted is picked up by a competing console. Even then, just grin and bear it. Your day will come....and then it will come again, and again and again.

    Things in the console world are better than they've ever been.

    You just have to open your eyes.

    • Re:I'm not worried at all (Score:4, Insightful)

      by jonabbey ( 2498 ) <jonabbey@ganymeta.org> on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @09:36PM (#5140341) Homepage

      The scary thing about Microsoft is that $40 billion in cash they've got burning a hole in their balance sheet. That's probably enough scratch to buy all gaming developers other than Sony and Nintendo themselves, and they've apparently tried to pick up Nintendo.

      The industry is better off so long as there is strong competition.. as Microsoft is currently in third place with X-Box, it probably won't hurt things too much to have them pick up Vivendi Interactive. If they were to pick up Vivendi, Sega, and Konami, say, and to still look hungry, then I'd be pretty worried.

      I'll still be pissed if I can't get StarCraft: Ghost on my new PS2, tho.

  • They can buy who they want, (Score:5, Insightful)

    by PotatoHead ( 12771 ) <doug.opengeek@org> on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @09:32PM (#5140285) Homepage Journal
    but I am still not going to buy an Xbox. For that matter I won't get a CE Pda, cell phone either.

    Sure, it's childish, but I really don't care. It is not about how good the machine is, it is about principle.

    Anyone that lets *one* company be the source for a large number of things in their life is a fool plain and simple.

    Why do you think business likes more than one source? It's so that source does not screw them over when things get tough. That is what happens to us when we are stupid enough to limit our choices.

    This applies to everyone, like it or not.

    Someday in the future, you might use your MS PC to send e-mail through your MS ISP that contains a picture encoded with your MS codec to your friend who better be using a MS capable machine in order to see anything you wrote or produced.

    Later that day you are interested in their thoughts, so you call on your MS phone on your way to work, where you use more MS products and services. You wind down at the end of the day with a game or two, maybe some pay per view media with your MS entertainment console.

    Your bank is intergrated with your MS computer so the fat MS bill comes out at just the right time each month.

    Now lets say most of us do this. Who is in control of our lives and choices? What incentive would MS have to act in our best interests?

    Exactly none.

    That's why I will not ever buy an X-box...
  • I'm gonna take this one time to bitch about how my identical news submission on this topic was rejected hours ago >...
  • They're gonna buy them...

    They're not gonny buy them...

    They're gonna buy them...

    They're not gonny buy them...

    Sheesh, it is like this Microsoft rumor is on a Bungie cord.

    Oh, wait..... :)~

  • Battle.net name change? (Score:5, Funny)

    by c0ol ( 628751 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @10:34PM (#5140696)
    please, not Battle.NET!? =\

  • A more reliable rumor (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Y-Crate ( 540566 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @10:35PM (#5140697)
    A more reliable rumor now circulating among game mags and their informers is that Half Life 2 is actually coming quite soon. The nature of the project has changed a bit, though.....

    Apparently the President of Valve has spent A LOT of time in Redmond.

    *coughXboxExclusiveTitle*cough*

    If the intent of "Xbox Exclusive" remains "It will come out somewhere else later on, almost always the PC" I will have no problem with this. The PC community is needed for modding. The Xbox can be where people go to play the game, and its mods with a performance guarantee.

  • This has happened before. MS bought Bungie (Score:3, Insightful)

    by acomj ( 20611 ) on Wednesday January 22, 2003 @11:02PM (#5140831) Homepage
    MS bought Bungie software. A mac game shop for a long time. Heck HALO was even demoed by Steve Jobs. The MS buys it and Bungie says, oh yeah, we'll still release Halo for the PC and Mac. MS put a stop that real quick.

    I guess when you have billions in the bank and can't develop your own titles you buy the talent..

    sigh....

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