Microsoft has presented a counter-statement after UK’s CMA (Competition and Markets Authority) expressed concerns about the Activision Blizzard deal. Sony’s trouble with the deal was predominantly about the Call of Duty games going exclusive on Xbox.
Related: Take-Two CEO is in favor of Microsoft-Activision acquisition
The company stated that Sony had been the console market leader for the past 20 years with double the size of Xbox. Microsoft argues that as a leader, Sony losing access to a single game (which is Call of Duty, if you need catching up) is not enough to cancel this agreement while 4,000 games can be played on the PlayStation.
According to the statement, Microsoft also mentioned Sony’s own acquisitions since the announcement of the Activision Blizzard deal while highlighting that there are five times more PlayStation-exclusive games compared to Xbox.
Xbox boss Phil Spencer had previously emphasized cross-platform’s importance for the future and hinted that there were no plans of making Call of Duty an Xbox exclusive by saying, “Reducing friction between our customers has to be the number one priority in the long run.”
The defense actually made Spencer’s words more concrete as it stated that Microsoft doesn’t have anything to gain from making Call of Duty an exclusive title:
“The value of Call of Duty depends on its community of gamers, the majority of whom are on PlayStation. Keeping Call of Duty on PlayStation is, therefore, a commercial imperative for the Xbox business.”
Microsoft’s response was reported by The Verge’s Tom Warren on Twitter, who also had a bonus tweet:
It looks like Microsoft is one step away from accusing the CMA of taking sides. One thing’s for certain; the game community still has no idea how and when this conflict will come to a satisfying conclusion.
