After the announcement that Microsoft is acquiring Activision Blizzard for 50billion pounds (or 68billion US Dollars) the biggest questions have been about the publisher’s leadership, but also whether blockbuster games like ‘Call of Duty will still be released on PlayStation consoles in the future, and it seems Sony has thoughts on this matter.
Speaking to the Wall Street Journal, a Sony spokesman said:
“We expect that Microsoft will abide by contractual agreements and continue to ensure Activision games are multiplatform”.
You can imagine this has got people a little nervy at Sony, as shares dropped by 13% in Tokyo right after the Activision Blizzard acquisition was announced. While PlayStation has plenty of its studios making exclusive titles like the forthcoming Horizon Forbidden West, titles like Crash Bandicoot have been synonymous with PlayStation consoles over the years. Likewise, Call of Duty is a massive franchise that has always done well on PlayStation as well as Xbox.
Furthermore, there are laws involving regulators that look into deals like this and if Microsoft were to shut Sony out entirely with this deal, it could be difficult to get past the regulators. Microsoft’s head of gaming, Phil Spencer, has already made it clear that Xbox isn’t intending to pull communities away from PlayStation platforms, but on the other hand, you don’t spend 50billion unless you have big plans for an acquisition’s properties.
It’s also difficult to know what contractual agreements Sony is referring to. There have been deals in the past with Call of Duty that bring modes to PS4 and PS5 before Xbox like in 2019’s Modern Warfare reboot, which had a Special Ops Survival Mode that was only on PlayStation for an entire year, then 2020’s Black Ops Cold War which had a Zombie mode called Onslaught which was also exclusive for a period.
