Breaking: Microsoft purchasing Zenimax for $7.5 billion.

[09philj]

Microsoft has announced it's acquiring Zenimax. Zenimax is the parent company of Bethesda, id Software, Arkane Studios, MachineGames and Tango Gameworks. This is a colossal, market shaking purchase. The downside is that this capitalist hellscape continues to tend towards a few big companies owning everything. The upside is that Microsoft might demand higher standards from Bethesda.

EDIT: Here's The Escapist's own story: https://www.escapistmagazine.com/v2/bethesda-joins-xbox-game-studios/

Original Eurogamer article: https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/...mpany-of-bethesda-id-software-and-more-report

 

[Gordon_4]

Elder Scrolls VI must look like the greatest game ever for Microsoft to spend closer than not to ten billion dollars on the monkey house responsible for Fallout 76

 

[faeyr]

This is wild. Hard to believe it was kept quiet until the deal was done. And to think that Disney "only" paid 4 billion for Star Wars.

 

[lil devils x]

I am still in shock. I am not sure how I feel about this yet.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

Microsoft has announced it's acquiring Zenimax. Zenimax is the parent company of Bethesda, id Software, Arkane Studios, MachineGames and Tango Gameworks. This is a colossal, market shaking purchase. The downside is that this capitalist hell scape continues to tend towards a few big companies owning everything. The upside is that Microsoft might demand higher standards from Bethesda.

Microsoft buying Bethesda and Zenimax for $7.5bn

UPDATE 4.30PM UK: According to Bloomberg [paywall], the established PS5 timed-exclusivity for Deathloop and Ghostwire: …

www.eurogamer.net

Or they’ll run them into the ground like so many others beforehand. The upside for Microsoft is they’ll probably finally have some good exclusives until that happens.

Guessing we can expect an XSX launch trailer revealing all those IPs they’ll now own to be at the very least timed exclusives, if not outright. Of course, nothing will change for the PC versions, except perhaps the old installers might be a conglomeration of sorts.

Sony must be a bit miffed at their behemoth rival’s buying power putting them back in the game.

Oh and one more thing, this perfectly shows why exclusives are so important in this game, because without them Sony would be a bit fucked as well.

 

[lil devils x]

Or they’ll run them into the ground like so many others beforehand. The upside for Microsoft is they’ll probably finally have some good exclusives until that happens.

Guessing we can expect an XSX launch trailer revealing all those IPs they’ll now own to be at the very least timed exclusives, if not outright. Of course, nothing will change for the PC versions, except perhaps the old installers might be a conglomeration of sorts.

Sony must be a bit miffed at their behemoth rival’s buying power putting them back in the game.

I really hope they don't ruin Bethesda, I am a huge fan of TES series. :s Hopefully this is instead good news and they will be injecting them with cash and letting them make better games?

 

[laggyteabag]

Very interesting news.

Microsoft had very few worthwhile games on the Xbox One, so it appears that the current strategy, following the previous rounds of acquisitions, is to just buy out a bunch of independent developers (and apparently an entire publisher).

I'll be interested to see what the reception of this is, though, because buying a company like Bethesda/Zenimax has massive implications for the multiplatform market, and I know people really like their Fallout/Elder Scrolls games.

Also curious to see that Xbox now owns Bethesda and Obsidian, so that is basically half of the western RPG genre under Microsoft's flag.

Im definitely curious to see how this effects Xbox Series X/S sales, and PS5 sales.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

I really hope they don't ruin Bethesda, I am a huge fan of TES series. :s Hopefully this is instead good news and they will be injecting them with cash and letting them make better games?

Zenimax was already huge beforehand, and with Microsoft’s track record it’s kind of a toss up. What works in their favor though is all these developers are already well established, so really all they have to do is maintain them without doing anything too stupid like restrict creative freedom or milk their IPs anymore than Zenimax. Also taking a page from Sony regarding their approach to delivery would be awesome, but it’s wishful thinking.

 

[meiam]

Microsoft recently seems to be moving away from having their own game store, so hopefully they'll tell bethesda to stop with theirs. That's pretty much the only positive I could see from this.

 

[lil devils x]

Microsoft recently seems to be moving away from having their own game store, so hopefully they'll tell bethesda to stop with theirs. That's pretty much the only positive I could see from this.

Their gear store ? Their DLC's? Micro transactions? Which store are you talking about?.. They have so many now.

 

[Samtemdo8]

Microsoft has announced it's acquiring Zenimax. Zenimax is the parent company of Bethesda, id Software, Arkane Studios, MachineGames and Tango Gameworks. This is a colossal, market shaking purchase. The downside is that this capitalist hellscape continues to tend towards a few big companies owning everything. The upside is that Microsoft might demand higher standards from Bethesda.

Microsoft buying Bethesda and Zenimax for $7.5bn

UPDATE 4.30PM UK: According to Bloomberg [paywall], the established PS5 timed-exclusivity for Deathloop and Ghostwire: …

www.eurogamer.net

The downside is Microsoft might pull Bethesda and iD games from GOG.com.

Or the upside being Microsoft keeps Bethesda stuff there and adds their own classic games on GOG. Like Age of Empires, Rise of Nations, Halo, and Fable.

 

[Samtemdo8]

Welp, this deal certainly now makes me wanna buy an Xbox Series X if Elder Scrolls and Dooms are exclusive to Xbox.

 

[meiam]

Their gear store ? Their DLC's? Micro transactions? Which store are you talking about?.. They have so many now.

Well they just moved everything on steam and they've abandoned games for windows (or w/e it was called)

 

[09philj]

Well they just moved everything on steam and they've abandoned games for windows (or w/e it was called)

...No. You can only buy a lot of Microsoft games (EG Forza Motorsport) on the Microsoft Store.

 

[BrawlMan]

Microsoft has announced it's acquiring Zenimax. Zenimax is the parent company of Bethesda, id Software, Arkane Studios, MachineGames and Tango Gameworks. This is a colossal, market shaking purchase. The downside is that this capitalist hellscape continues to tend towards a few big companies owning everything. The upside is that Microsoft might demand higher standards from Bethesda.

EDIT: Here's The Escapist's own story: https://www.escapistmagazine.com/v2/bethesda-joins-xbox-game-studios/

Original Eurogamer article: https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/...mpany-of-bethesda-id-software-and-more-report

God damn it! Now Evil Within 3is going to be a Microsoft exclusive!

 

[CriticalGaming]

So that's kind of interesting considering Sony has been showing off Deathloop for six months and it hasn't even been blurpped about by Microsoft.

Well this certainly gives Microsoft some more 1st party potential. Fallout 5, Elder Scrolls 6, being Xbox exclusives could be the exact things that they need in order to make their console actually competitive.

Good. Honestly. I hate Xbox, but I realize that you need legit competition to make companies drive forward.

However let's be real for a second. Bethesda is a good fit of trash for Microsoft because both companies love their extra microtransactions.

I will remind people that there has not been a single big Sony exclusive to include extra monetization. God of War, Horizon, Persona, even Square Enix games (which normally don't shy away from MT's) have left them off their Sony exclusives Final Fantasy 7 Remake, Trials of Mana, on and on.

Meanwhile even as early as Forza 5 which was an Xbone launch title, Microsoft filled their trash with Lootbox bullshit.

 

[CriticalGaming]

God damn it! Now Evil Within 3is going to be a Microsoft exclusive!

Don't forget they put everything on PC.

 

[BrawlMan]

Don't forget they put everything on PC.

My laptop is nowhere near powerful enough to run that. My brother has a new gaming laptop, but right now my money is there something more important. I'm not invested in getting a gaming laptop or rig at the moment.

 

[Hades]

Oh wow. I did not see that coming. I would have been somewhat annoyed at the new Elder Scrolls being exclusive to the Xbox which I don't own and the PC which I do not trust to run it. However given Bethesda's recent track record I might not have even bought it to begin with.

 

[CriticalGaming]

My laptop is nowhere near powerful enough to run that. My brother has a new gaming laptop, but right now my money is there something more important. I'm not invested in getting a gaming laptop or rig at the moment.

I mean bethesda stuff usually can run on a potato if you minimize the settings. And who knows where you'll be by the time Evil 3 comes out. Have faith my dude.