Just yesterday there was a poll going around on Twitter of which of the big 3 gaming companies, Nintendo, Sony, and MS is the "least bad" or something like that, and I saw a lot of people saying Microsoft. I figured they'd do something stupid soon to remind everyone how Microsoft operates, but didn't think it would be so soon!
I can't believe these studio acquisitions still aren't being blocked. At what point will they finally acknowledge the blatant anti-competition Microsoft regularly demonstrates by buying any studio that gets too big, letting them rot, and then killing them off?
You gotta think like a gamer. Microsoft will make Call of Duty free on gamepass. Meanwhile, Nintendo graphics suck and they hate mods. and Sony is too greedy in buying exclusives and keeping them off PC. MS wins by default with this mindset. Their backwards compatibility and PC support is indeed the best out of the 3, but that only helps out PC players (who seem to dominate a lot of this discussion).
Seeing the reactions on Reddit or Twitter really show how either young or ignorant the average video game commenter is on how the industry works. just instant gratification at any cost, and if it's denied it's war. Just look at how ballistic they went for needing an extra account for Helldivers, then read up on the news for these layoffs for a game they loved and see the slight murmur in comparison.
HN has some of that too, but there's at least some professionals here that will sympathize with the developers.
Gamepass is pretty generous. Gamers see MS buy a studio and add their catalog to gamepass. PC gamers appreciate that Xbox games are also usually on PC.
Nintendo sends a ton of C&D letters to smaller developers, and are pretty anti-emulation. Games never go on sale. Remakes are expensive ($60 for Super Mario RPG for example).
Sony just had the whole "You need a PSN account to play a PC game" thing. But also, you can't create a PSN account in some countries, so sorry you can't play the PC game you bought anymore. They ended up walking it back though. You also need to pay to play online, which is a thing on xbox as well. But I think that's usually drowned out by the "PC Gamers" who don't need to pay for something like that.
Every once in a while they'll do a generous move to essentially buy the good graces of gamers -- e.g. backwards compatibility, launching new releases day one on GamePass (I don't consider that a good thing but whatever), making some custom accessible controller for the disabled, etc.
But as with any shitty corporation like MS, it's not charity. It's an investment to distract everyone from the fact that they're a shitty corporation. And it works apparently!
I can't believe these studio acquisitions still aren't being blocked. At what point will they finally acknowledge the blatant anti-competition Microsoft regularly demonstrates by buying any studio that gets too big, letting them rot, and then killing them off?