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Analyst - "One of my favorite studios, Tokyo-based FromSoftware, is currently rumored to be an M&A candidate for Sony."

ChorizoPicozo

Gold Member
If only we could turn back time and prevent all this acquisition craziness from happen...



Yeah it all sucks to be honest. We can only hope something good comes from the Bungie and ActivisionBlizzard acquisitions where exclusives play a smaller role.
I play on all platforms but I have so many friends that are directly affected this madness. And even I get annoyed since I can no longer choose the hardware where a game would run the best.
It's was inevitable. And is good for everyone, including gamers.
 

MonarchJT

Banned
Maybe, but as of right now nothing points to that, their current idea is that if people could play a better version on their PC then why would they buy a console?
people who wanna play on console exactly the same reason why the Xbox is constantly sold out while releasing everything on PC on day one and with the aggravating circumstance that everything is released on day one even on a cheap service like gamepass and that the Xbox doesn't have a brand power that Sony has

Of course someone would give up the console to buy everything on PC ... but the increase in software sold would greatly make up for this lost hw sales
 
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Zeroing

Banned


Yeah it all sucks to be honest. We can only hope something good comes from the Bungie and ActivisionBlizzard acquisitions where exclusives play a smaller role.
I play on all platforms but I have so many friends that are directly affected by this madness. And even I get annoyed since I can no longer choose the hardware where a game would run the best.
My way of thinking is this: it could be worse... if Sony and Nintendo had as much money as MS, then all would descent into chaos.
What to this day baffles me is when people started celebrating Bethesda and Activision acquisitions as a "win".
 

Fredrik

Member
people who wanna play on console exactly the same reason why the Xbox is constantly sold out while releasing everything on PC on day one and with the aggravating circumstance that everything is released on day one even on a cheap service like gamepass and that the Xbox doesn't have a brand power that Sony has
I know but this is not how Sony is thinking, they use console exclusives to sell consoles and late PC releases to get a second sales burst.
 

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
As long as games stay day one on PC and are available on Steam, do what you need to do Sony. If anything changes then that would genuinely be a potential fuck Sony and their consoles etc from me. I'm not buying on epic and I'm not waiting a year for some shit epic platform port.

Imagine only being able to play elden ring on the ps5 with that poor port with all those issues. Didn't even have vrr. I think the speed run community and no hit would have a massive issue and that's my goto twitch viewing lol.

But honestly, the rumours of purchasing are just ruining this generation imo. I wish every company could just get it all out of the way and as long as everything keeps coming to PC day one on Steam it's all good.
 

ChorizoPicozo

Gold Member
No it's not.
Yes it is.
When so few companies will control all the major gaming franchises what do you think will happen?
Irrelevant. This is not about that.
The only sliver lining is the fact that this is a creative industry that is reliant on people to make games and the most talented minds will still be free to branch out as they see fit.
Not the point.
 
No it's not.

When so few companies will control all the major gaming franchises what do you think will happen?

The only sliver lining is the fact that this is a creative industry that is reliant on people to make games and the most talented minds will still be free to branch out as they see fit.

There will always be new studios. Buying a company doesn’t equate to buying devs, especially long term. There has been 20 new AAA gaming studios formed in the past 3 years from senior game designers.

The next big game innovation/ip is most likely gonna be from a new studio, not these fossils everyone are fighting over and worrying about. A big company like activision or bungie gets bought and in a few years 3 studios split off and form from them. Like a Hydra, thats how the gaming industry is, theres no way to control and monopolize all the talent.

Same goes for IP. Sony owned Demon’s Souls so Fromsoft went and made Dark Souls. Konami owned metal gear so Kojima made Death Stranding. IP doesn’t really mean anything anymore. People follow the talent.
 
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MonarchJT

Banned
Also funny how people are so sure sony games will be day 1 on PC by the end of 2022 but also show concern that if they bought Fromsoft that pc gamers would never get games.

Which is it?
they will be day one....is absolutely inevitable. (we will start to see close to the end of this gen) Sony if anyone hasn't figured it out yet, are preparing everything for this .... from buying Epic shares to acquiring famous porting studios
 
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Zeroing

Banned
It's was inevitable. And is good for everyone, including gamers.
nah, I am talking about MS, put that money on new studios, hire new people fresh out of school. Make them do new IPs, even if it fails it would be better than going out shopping like an entitled rich kid. Even Sony did it with pixel opus. Why MS cannot?
 

Fredrik

Member
My way of thinking is this: it could be worse... if Sony and Nintendo had as much money as MS, then all would descent into chaos.
What to this day baffles me is when people started celebrating Bethesda and Activision acquisitions as a "win".
Agreed, it could be worse, but it’s still bad as it is. And people stop using their brain when it’s about console war. Anyone with mainstream gaming friends should know how much it all actually sucks. Almost daily I talk with friends about something awesome in a game and then realize ”oh wait, sorry, forgot this isn’t on [insert platform of choice here]”. The reality is that people usually only have one console. We’re the strange ones who have them all.
 
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they will be day one....is absolutely inevitable. (we will start to see close to the end of this gen) Sony if anyone hasn't figured it out yet, are preparing everything for this .... from buying Epic shares to acquiring famous porting studios

So there really should be no concern from pc players about getting Fromsoft games at this point. If anything they should be glad considering how much better sonys last few PC ports have been versus Fromsofts.
 
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Zeroing

Banned
Agreed, it could be wirse, but it’s still bad as it is. And people stop using their brain when it’s about console war. Anyone with mainstream gaming friends should know how much it all actually sucks. Almost daily I talk with friends about something awesome in a game and then realize ”oh wait, sorry, forgot this isn’t on [insert platform of choice here]”. The reality is that people usually only have one console. We’re the strange ones who have them all.
Yeah and in extreme cases people buy a PS or Xbox and a Switch. it does not make sense for most people to get all of them.
 

ChorizoPicozo

Gold Member
nah, I am talking about MS, put that money on new studios, hire new people fresh out of school. Make them do new IPs, even if it fails it would be better than going out shopping like an entitled rich kid. Even Sony did it with pixel opus. Why MS cannot?
I get what you are saying. And MS fucked up by not investing* in First party and new IP.

But this is not about that.
 
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MonarchJT

Banned
So there really should be no concern for pc players about getting Fromsoft games at this point. If anything they should be glad considering how much better sonys last few PC ports have been versus Fromsofts.
people always complain. and By the way I think that thanks to the success (given by the votes of the outlets) of elden ring we will see so many souls like come out in the next period also from technically more capable studios than fromsoft (not that it is difficult lol) that all will soon be forgotten especially if for some obscure reason they would confine those games to ps only. It would be an incredible opportunity for other devs to fill that abandoned slice of the market.
 
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DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
There will always be new studios. Buying a company doesn’t equate to buying devs, especially long term. There has been 20 new AAA gaming studios formed in the past 3 years from senior game designers.

The next big game innovation/ip is most likely gonna be from a new studio, not these fossils everyone are fighting over and worrying about. A big company like activision or bungie gets bought and in a few years 3 studios split off and form from them. Like a Hydra, thats how the gaming industry is, theres no way to control and monopolize all the talent.

Same goes for IP. Sony owned Demon’s Souls so Fromsoft went and made Dark Souls. Konami owned metal gear so Kojima made Death Stranding. IP doesn’t really mean anything anymore. People follow the talent.
What talent though? There seems to be a couple of really great games launching a year if you are lucky and none of them are really huge triple A games. It's mainly smaller stuff like returnal or indie games like Tunic.

I don't feel there's really any talent that is delivering great games consistently outside of Miyazaki, Nintendo always seem to hit a decent level of quality. When was sonys last big ground breaking game, the divisive last of us 2? Is that two years old now?

I hope we get to a point where there's a genuine decent game coming out at least once every quarter or once every month ideally. I'd take smaller game pass games of very high quality that were 6 to 8 hours long If it was once a month or maybe 15 hours once every 3 months. I don't need these huge 80 hour games. Leave those to elden ring once every 5 years and 100s of hours of replayability.

Probably will never get that though.
 

Zok310

Banned
Everyone have a problem with how companies spend their money and there seems to be some unspoken rule that gamers know more than gaming company xyz.
In 5 years the shape of the gaming industry is going to make so many of yall vomit.
MS open the flood gates and they ain't closing. And despite what many of you think, the reason for these acquisitions is not to bring you more content, its ONLY done so you can bring company abc all your wealth.
Just like MS, Sony and Nintendo will gobble up what they can to stay relevant.
 
people always complain. and By the way I think that thanks to the success (given by the votes of the outlets) of elden ring we will see so many souls like come out in the next period also from technically more capable studios than fromsoft (not that it is difficult lol) that all will soon be forgotten especially if for some obscure reason they would confine those games to ps only. It would be an incredible opportunity for other devs to fill that abandoned slice of the market.

It hasn’t happened yet, and there are no shortage of souls-like clones, even Fromsoft themselves couldn’t do it justice without Miyazaki.
 

ChorizoPicozo

Gold Member
Everyone have a problem with how companies spend their money and there seems to be some unspoken rule that gamers know more than gaming company xyz.
Yeah. Cuz they (gamers) are dumb.

In 5 years the shape of the gaming industry is going to make so many of yall vomit.
Some aspects.
MS open the flood gates and they ain't closing. And despite what many of you think, the reason for these acquisitions is not to bring you more content, its ONLY done so you can bring company abc all your wealth.
Just like MS, Sony and Nintendo will gobble up what they can to stay relevant.
That's why all of this was inevitable.
 
What talent though? There seems to be a couple of really great games launching a year if you are lucky and none of them are really huge triple A games. It's mainly smaller stuff like returnal or indie games like Tunic.

I don't feel there's really any talent that is delivering great games consistently outside of Miyazaki, Nintendo always seem to hit a decent level of quality. When was sonys last big ground breaking game, the divisive last of us 2? Is that two years old now?

I hope we get to a point where there's a genuine decent game coming out at least once every quarter or once every month ideally. I'd take smaller game pass games of very high quality that were 6 to 8 hours long If it was once a month or maybe 15 hours once every 3 months. I don't need these huge 80 hour games. Leave those to elden ring once every 5 years and 100s of hours of replayability.

Probably will never get that though.

Last year, Returnal


ezgif.com-gif-maker-71fbbdac2f1956467.gif
 
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Aqusition candidate? So in other words Sony would love to be able to buy From Software?
I mean, who wouldn't want to buy From Software? They would also love to buy Take 2, Ubisoft and EA.
 

Kagey K

Banned
*Yawn*

I could aquire Xbox tomorrow if all these tales from the ass are to be believed.

Call me when anyone says something substantial.
 
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Heisenberg007

Gold Journalism
This is one acquisition that will help both companies equally.

FromSoftware will get access to game engines and tech that they really need + PlayStation Studios will learn so much from FromSoftware's art direction, world-building, and gameplay mechanics. Imagine an Elden Ring sequel with Demon Soul (PS5) level polish, stability, visuals, and performance.
 

3liteDragon

Member
My way of thinking is this: it could be worse... if Sony and Nintendo had as much money as MS, then all would descent into chaos.
What to this day baffles me is when people started celebrating Bethesda and Activision acquisitions as a "win".
Funny how some of these people are worried FromSoft titles might be exclusive to PlayStation if they get acquired, that alone would be entertaining just for the meltdowns.
 

Heisenberg007

Gold Journalism
What talent though? There seems to be a couple of really great games launching a year if you are lucky and none of them are really huge triple A games. It's mainly smaller stuff like returnal or indie games like Tunic.

I don't feel there's really any talent that is delivering great games consistently outside of Miyazaki, Nintendo always seem to hit a decent level of quality. When was sonys last big ground breaking game, the divisive last of us 2? Is that two years old now?

I hope we get to a point where there's a genuine decent game coming out at least once every quarter or once every month ideally. I'd take smaller game pass games of very high quality that were 6 to 8 hours long If it was once a month or maybe 15 hours once every 3 months. I don't need these huge 80 hour games. Leave those to elden ring once every 5 years and 100s of hours of replayability.

Probably will never get that though.
  • God of War in 2018 (one-shot camera in an open-world game)
  • Death Stranding in 2019 (unique gameplay that focuses on traversal and avoiding combat; penalizes kills)
  • Dreams (nothing like this on the market) and The Last of Us 2 (groundbreaking animation, attention to detail, and visuals) in 2020
  • Returnal in 2021 (first AAA narrative-driven 3D bullet hell)
If you narrow your search by "company name" and "big" and "ground breaking games", you will hardly have a couple of games in a generation. Every game follows certain tropes and formula. Nobody is reinventing the wheel because there isn't much room to do so.

As amazing as Elden Ring is, even that follows the same Demon Soul's formula from 2009. It's Dark Souls but now in an open world.
 

tommib

Member
they will be day one....is absolutely inevitable. (we will start to see close to the end of this gen) Sony if anyone hasn't figured it out yet, are preparing everything for this .... from buying Epic shares to acquiring famous porting studios
Bit tired of this day one obsession from the green rats. I heard last year we were going to get Tsushima, Returnal, Demon’s Souls on PC after 6 months of exclusivity and then everything would be day one going forward. GT7 was going to be day-one.

Mr Mayor Waiting GIF by NBC


Why do you need this day-one validation? Because Xbox does it? I don’t get it.
 

Zeroing

Banned
Funny how some of these people are worried FromSoft titles might be exclusive to PlayStation if they get acquired, that alone would be entertaining just for the meltdowns.
Quite frankly, karma is a b*tch and I do expect meltdowns specially since everyone has been joking with Sony's "organic growth" well if the super secret deal comes to fruition people will commit account suicide.
 
how much would from soft go for any way?
The entire Kadokawa corporation is valued around 3b US. Which is less than Sony paid for Bungie, whatever mark up/“premium” sony would have to pay outside of that would still be less than a company like Capcom, or Square enix, even if it were double its market value.

Like i said earlier sony already own a small minority of Kadokawa and multiple IP from them so its all conjecture as to what they would ultimate be paying to buy them

Sony could buy all of Kadokawa and still have money left over in its acquisition budget
 
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I thought the same, I think some forget that From is already owned.

I think some people forget that neither Fromsoft nor Kadokawa own the Elden Ring IP

In fact, they don’t actually own most of their popular IP outside of Sekiro.

Bloodborne, Demon’s Souls, and Deracine are owned by Sony

Dark Souls and Elden Ring are owned by Bandai Namco

The only toes Sony would be stepping on in this theoretical acquisition would be Bandai Namco as they’ve been their go-to publishing partner in the west
 
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DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
  • God of War in 2018 (one-shot camera in an open-world game)
  • Death Stranding in 2019 (unique gameplay that focuses on traversal and avoiding combat; penalizes kills)
  • Dreams (nothing like this on the market) and The Last of Us 2 (groundbreaking animation, attention to detail, and visuals) in 2020
  • Returnal in 2021 (first AAA narrative-driven 3D bullet hell)
If you narrow your search by "company name" and "big" and "ground breaking games", you will hardly have a couple of games in a generation. Every game follows certain tropes and formula. Nobody is reinventing the wheel because there isn't much room to do so.

As amazing as Elden Ring is, even that follows the same Demon Soul's formula from 2009. It's Dark Souls but now in an open world.

god of war and returnal speak to me completely. Adored those games. I think God Of War 2018 is one of the best games ever made. Love it.

Going to give Death Stranding another go but it didnt do much for me when i first tried but I am all for Kojima getting to make the games he wants.

Like I said, for me as long as the games come to PC day one and arent locked to Epic games store I'm all for Sony buying From. I have played all my from soft games outside of Bloodborne and demons souls on PC from their release, so it would suck for me if they went with some exclusive route, I think it would upset millions of PC gamers too and would backfire on Sony IMO but that is a hypothetical situation and not worth thinking about unless it happened.
 
god of war and returnal speak to me completely. Adored those games. I think God Of War 2018 is one of the best games ever made. Love it.

Going to give Death Stranding another go but it didnt do much for me when i first tried but I am all for Kojima getting to make the games he wants.

Like I said, for me as long as the games come to PC day one and arent locked to Epic games store I'm all for Sony buying From. I have played all my from soft games outside of Bloodborne and demons souls on PC from their release, so it would suck for me if they went with some exclusive route, I think it would upset millions of PC gamers too and would backfire on Sony IMO but that is a hypothetical situation and not worth thinking about unless it happened.
If you mean backfire as in, millions of more clients buying into the playstation ecosystem, then I agree with your assessment :messenger_tears_of_joy:
It certainly would make the shortages of ps5 even worse.
 

Dream-Knife

Banned
If you mean backfire as in, millions of more clients buying into the playstation ecosystem, then I agree with your assessment :messenger_tears_of_joy:
It certainly would make the shortages of ps5 even worse.
They're not going to go out and buy the system.

See the demand for a bloodborne pc port.
 
If it happens I hope they get a bungie like deal.
I want games to be for everyone who want to play them.
This console war BS is just that, BS.
 

Three

Member
As long as games stay day one on PC and are available on Steam, do what you need to do Sony. If anything changes then that would genuinely be a potential fuck Sony and their consoles etc from me. I'm not buying on epic and I'm not waiting a year for some shit epic platform port.

Imagine only being able to play elden ring on the ps5 with that poor port with all those issues. Didn't even have vrr. I think the speed run community and no hit would have a massive issue and that's my goto twitch viewing lol.

But honestly, the rumours of purchasing are just ruining this generation imo. I wish every company could just get it all out of the way and as long as everything keeps coming to PC day one on Steam it's all good.
What? The PS version of Elden ring had the least issues of the lot and the higher more stable framerate on consoles. Hardly "poor port", it was likely lead platform.

Sony release their games on all stores anyway too so I'm not sure where this Epic store thing is coming from either. Even if they do as long as it still comes to PC what's the issue. I mean a bunch of people here use the mandatory shit known as the windows/MS store of all things for their gamepass games and seem to cheerlead it and the MS acquisitions all the time.
 
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