Published , by Chris Jarrard
Published , by Chris Jarrard
UPDATED 1/20/2022 @ 2:37 p.m. PT: Phil Spencer recently claimed via his Twitter that he had spoken with Sony leadership, confirming that existing contractual obligations for Activision Blizzard will be honored and the Call of Duty franchise will not be leaving PlayStation platforms as far as business goes for the time being.
Original Story: In case you are just logging onto the internet for the first time this week, you may have missed a little bit of video game news. Microsoft surprised us all with the acquisition of Activision Blizzard on Tuesday morning and we are still in the fallout phase of the announcement. Many gamers had questions about what this news could mean for their favorite games. There has been speculation that Microsoft would make all Activision Blizzard IP exclusive to the Xbox and PC ecosystems, but rival Sony believes that existing contractual agreements will be honored. Sony and Call of Duty have long been partners and the popular shooter is likely to remain available for PlayStation owners.
A Sony representative spoke on the record with The Wall Street Journal about the situation. “We expect that Microsoft will abide by contractual agreements and continue to ensure Activision games are multiplatform,” the representative explained. In recent years, PlayStation consoles have seen exclusive content for Call of Duty games as part of an ongoing relationship between Sony and Activision Blizzard.
It makes sense that Microsoft would look to avoid a messy legal battle just to pull Activision Blizzard IP away from Sony. On top of that, keeping a franchise such as Call of Duty away from the millions of active PlayStation gamers would most likely result in declining revenues. Having total control of a product has its advantages, but they aren't worth ignoring a massive market of customers ready to buy said product.
An unnamed source familiar with the situation spoke with Bloomberg and expects Microsoft to leave some games available on PlayStation systems while others would become Microsoft-exclusive. We saw this previously with Minecraft, which stayed platform-agnostic following its acquisition by Microsoft back in 2014.
For more coverage on the Microsoft-Activision Blizzard megadeal, be sure to keep checking in with Shacknews. Additionally, you can also have a look at 10 questions about Microsoft's purchase of Activision Blizzard as written by Senior Editor Ozzie Mejia.