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Jim Ryan confirms Sony ‘has more studio acquisitions planned’ (VGC)

I don’t like him at all but I’ll admit he’s the only “insider” that actually gets stuff right 99% of the time.

Same.

I disagree with how he presents the information but he’s bang on most of the time. What I like about Jason is that he doesn’t fabricate BS when it comes to leaks. Very reliable IMO.
 

Zeroing

Banned
Can someone tell me what is the conclusion of the studios most people are thinking? BTW not the first time Sony buys old IPs...
 

Zeroing

Banned
Square Enix 🤮, Capcom 🙂, trollimaPro 😶
Nah Sony does not want to touch Square Enix even with a stick... it is a mess. Unless they are waiting for Square Enix to keep getting worse...But Sony is not that evil right?

Capcom, maybe it does make sense.

LOL Kojima, if giving their own engine and sharing your studios tech and expertise does not make Kojima wants to be part of Sony then I have no idea what Sony can do.
 
Nah Sony does not want to touch Square Enix even with a stick... it is a mess. Unless they are waiting for Square Enix to keep getting worse...But Sony is not that evil right?

Capcom, maybe it does make sense.

LOL Kojima, if giving their own engine and sharing your studios tech and expertise does not make Kojima wants to be part of Sony then I have no idea what Sony can do.
You ask for the studios most people where thinking. And my emojis explain it all.
 
Can someone tell me what is the conclusion of the studios most people are thinking? BTW not the first time Sony buys old IPs...

Realistically, Deviation games, Firewalk (x Probably Monsters), maybe Arrowhead or Emberlab. Another support studio that already does a good amount of work for them like White Moon Dreams.

Nothing else is realistic at all
 
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Zeroing

Banned
You ask for the studios most people where thinking. And my emojis explain it all.
I know, I just feel like typing today, sorry ;)

Realistically, Deviation games, Firewalk (x Probably Monsters), maybe Arrowhead or Emberlab. Another support studio that already does a good amount of work for them like White Moon Dreams.

Nothing else is realistic at all
You might be into something, I got that feeling....

He didn't ask for realistic.
True but I expected way more unrealistic like Ubisoft or Nintendo.... lol
 

Heisenberg007

Gold Journalism
Depending on how much Sony wants to shell out, and assuming the rumors of Sony buying a big publisher is true, I think it'll be one of the following:
  • Capcom
  • Ubisoft
  • Take 2
 

yurinka

Member
Can someone tell me what is the conclusion of the studios most people are thinking? BTW not the first time Sony buys old IPs...
In case they would want to sell (I bet they don't) Capcom, Kadokawa or -if they can afford them now- Riot or Bandai Namco.

Not as appealing for them but maybe more likely to sell CD Project, Arrowhead, Firewalk, ARC System Works and some successful VR studio who already had worked for them.
 
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In case they would want to sell (I bet they don't) Capcom, Kadokawa or -if they can afford them now- Riot or Bandai Namco.

Not as appealing for them but maybe more likely to sell CD Project, Arrowhead, Firewalk, ARC System Works and some successful VR studio who already had worked for them.

Riot is 100% owned by Tencent
 

yurinka

Member
I keep telling you, this fanfiction stuff is getting out of hand. MS "rushed to buy CoD" as a response to... Bungie? Despite us already knowing the exact layout of how everything went down, including Microsoft/Phil interested in buying ABK before they wanted to sell, we know for a fact that CoD averages 100m MaU compared to Destiny's 6m MaU. And this is factoring Vanguard's disastrous launch and not taking into account this year's MW2 being the biggest CoD in quite some time combined with Warzone 2. MaU, that you know, has been very important to Microsoft since last generation? MaU, that, oh I don't know, is extremely important to Game Pass?

Then you factor in Overwatch, WoW, Diablo, motherfucking Candy Crush, and we don't even need to talk about the rest of the portfolio. We know that Microsoft had seen the future line-up for many ABK studios, especially Blizzard, and have been told the future looks incredibly bright. We even knew this beforehand, due to the court proceedings, because Microsoft requested to see their upcoming business pipeline before agreeing to Kotick's $100 per share asking price, to which Kotick agreed (according to Hoeg Law, companies don't do this unless very far into proceedings that have a high chance to occur). Microsoft was pleased at what they saw, raised their offer to $95 per share and that was that.

The fact that you even this was a response to Sony buying Bungie is so laughable that words cannot describe it.

Furthermore, we know that Bungie were talking to Microsoft before Sony. Yes, Bungie and MS denied this both occasions it was brought up. Obviously, because it never transpired. But even aside from big-time MS reporters leaking this, we have NateDrake from the other site (reputable leaker with a good track record that has his stuff get posted here and elsewhere, before you pretend he is a nobody), who, in a response to why Bungie and Microsoft talks fell through, said that Bungie wanted in the area of 2 billion and to remain independent:


He said this in SEPTEMBER 2020. We had zero idea Sony was buying Bungie until early 2022. Not only that, but he was right on everything: Sans the extra money Sony paid for retention, Bungie got exactly $2bil~ and also got to remain independent. I'd like to see you spin that. Let me guess, coincidence?

That said, you're implying that, since MS was in talks with Bungie first, MS denied (obviously because Bungies was asking for far more then they're worth to Microsoft, as opposed to being valuable for Sony who desperately needs the GaaS talent due to their GaaS ambitions, as per Jimbo himself), somehow saw that Bungie was then immediately going to Sony, and "rushed to buy CoD?"

I mean, this is a rhetorical question. Everybody knows you're going to spin this so crazily that in the end we're all going to forget what we were talking about, anyway. As per usual.
The fanfictions are the "rumors" you post. No, we don't know for a fact if Bungie did talk with MS before selling to Sony. What we know for a fact is that Bungie left MS and some years later sold 100% of the company to the direct competition of MS.

Sony bought 100% of Bungie, they aren't independent anymore: Sony owns them and as they owner and boss allows them to continue to operatte with their own publisher, independent from PS Studios but still under their owner SIE. This is a fact.

MS and ABK said when they started their talks, and it was a handful days after he sent this mail. Sony and Bungie also mentioned when they started their talks and it was months before tthat. Sony started to talk with Bungie before MS started to talk with ABK, this is another fact.

The 100M MAU combines all CoD games, but comes obviously mostly CoD Mobile and Warzone. The yearly CoD games sold each between 20 and 30M copies after their lifetime, so obviously can't have 100MAU themselves. MAU is important for MS for their press release notes and only mean amount of people active, even if without paying anything for it. MS posts MAU instead of other metrics which are more important like games sold, consoles sold, Gold subs, gamepass revenue, gamepass profitt or profit from their game division because to make them public wouldn't make them look good when compared against the competition. Because if they were proud of them tthey would show them.

I don't say the ABK acquisition is a response to the Bungie acquisition, I say it's possible it could be a reaction and that it's impossible that the Bungie acquisittion would be a reaction to the ABK acquisittion because the negotiattions of the Bungie one started before.

Did you read past his first sentence?

Not only does he contradict his first sentence right after, but he has said similar things a few times in the past in different threads. Aside from the latter, if he didn't straight up contradict himself, I wouldn't have wrote what I wrote.
The sentence doesn't contradict anything. Maybe I didn't explain it properly and you misunderstood it. I said MS maybe knew Sony was buying Bungie, not that this was the reason -or at least the main reason- to go and acquire ABK.

Notice that after that sentence I say "I think MS already had plans to buy publishers", meaning they already planned to buy a big publisher soon and had the budget ready for it. They went to talk with Kottick, saw he wanted to sell and bought it. Their negotiations went super fast, a record for a transaction that big, meaning that super likely they already had the idea of buying a huge publisher and had the money ready for it.

I think it's highly MS knew about the Sony x Bungie acquisition while it was being negotiated specially knowing many Bungie staff did work previously with MS and off the record this kind of news are often shared between friends/former coworkers even if they are super sensitive stuff. In my case I have a lot of friends and former coworkers in dozens of studios and I ofter hear about acquisitions -not these two- before they are announced.

If something, they could have affected them to want to close and announced it fast (maybe this is why they did pay such premium for it), before Sony announced the Bungie deal. But obviously they are two very different scales, and someone doesn't rush to spend $70B because being butthurtted.

My main idea with the sentence is that since the Bungie acquisition started before the ABK it was impossible that it could be a reaction to it. While not in the opposite. And in any case, I don't think the main reasons behind these acquisitions are to react to the other acquisition. I see them more as part of their long term merge & acquisittions and growth strategies set several years ago helping them to grow in each case in a different direction to achieve very different goals.

Riot is 100% owned by Tencent
Oops. In this case call Jimbo and tell him to buy Tencent xDD
 
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DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
I feel like this gen and its news cycle will mainly be about acquisitions and less about games. Would be awesome to see more games. We are in such a lull. It's pants.

Would be good for Sony to grab Kojima imo and continue to fund his crazy ideas. We need that kind of stuff imo.
 

Borowski_1

Member
I feel like this gen and its news cycle will mainly be about acquisitions and less about games. Would be awesome to see more games. We are in such a lull. It's pants.

Would be good for Sony to grab Kojima imo and continue to fund his crazy ideas. We need that kind of stuff imo.
this

where are the games at?
 
I feel like this gen and its news cycle will mainly be about acquisitions and less about games. Would be awesome to see more games. We are in such a lull. It's pants.

Would be good for Sony to grab Kojima imo and continue to fund his crazy ideas. We need that kind of stuff imo.

He’s been hinting heavily at doing something with Sony. I wouldn’t be surprised if Kojima is making another crazy game like DesthStranding.
 
Tencent is worth way more than Sony lol
Tencent would be the one buying Sony not Sony buy Tencent :messenger_tears_of_joy:

Realistically the Japanese government would probably not allow that especially since it’s Sony. Sony is a company that played a pretty big part in rebuilding Japan after WW2. Pretty sure many wouldn’t like it if Tencent bought them specially since Tencent is a foreign company.
 

oldergamer

Member
LOL, typing on a phone. My bad.

WB is under AT&T which is publicly traded. So Sony trying to scoop up WB games will face the same type of scrutiny that Microsoft is facing now. So Sony is unlikely to even try to make that play. And I doubt Microsoft would sit idly by anyway, since they did have their eyes on them before.
I said it before and will say it again. If wb games is for sale (which it isnt). There is little chance they would sell to sony due to them having Spiderman and marvel licenses. Batman will not play second fiddle to spiderman. No chance of that happening.
 

Infamy v1

Member
The fanfictions are the "rumors" you post. No, we don't know for a fact if Bungie did talk with MS before selling to Sony. What we know for a fact is that Bungie left MS and some years later sold 100% of the company to the direct competition of MS.
See, this is why Sony fanboys like you have popular content creators make fun of them weekly on YouTube and get paid to do so. All fanboys say stupid shit from time to time, but the level of delusion and desperation emanating from your posts are seriously insane.

Let me get this straight, popular leakers like Jez, Jeff Grubb and Tom who have extremely high track records say Bungie were in talks with Microsoft in 2020. Later on that same year (2020), it gets leaked again that they were in talks but it fell through because Bungie had an asking price that was too high, and another very respected leaker with a high track record (NateDrake) said Bungie wanted $2b~ and to retain their independence. Now, in 2022, the exact same stipulations that Nate said Bungie wanted occured. I even linked proof of this, date-stamped and everything. You don't even address any of this because you don't have a way to spin it like you normally do.

You have the testicular fortitude to tell me that all that is fanfiction, yet implying Microsoft bought ABK as a response to Bungie is not fanfiction? And doubling down on "well, we know they were in talks with ABK after Sony was with Bungie, so it's a possibility 🤪" is not fanfiction?

I've proved my case. Try again.

Sony bought 100% of Bungie, they aren't independent anymore: Sony owns them and as they owner and boss allows them to continue to operatte with their own publisher, independent from PS Studios but still under their owner SIE. This is a fact.

Here you go again. What are you talking about? You know what independent is referring to, given Bungies history and the official press release by Sony and Jim himself. But you have to find a way to desperately fit in "Sony is the owner and Sony is the boss and they allowed" into dozens of your posts for some reason. You do this while ignoring the above, ignoring Bungies history with independence and ignoring this is extremely unusual for Sony to do and doesn't fit with their usual modus operandi. The main reason Bungie remains independent the way they are positioned and will continue to publish all their future games on "rival consoles" is due to Bungie and their stipulations, not Sony. Sony is a company that paid extra money to moneyhat Destiny's DLC for a second year to be off Xbox, lmao. Anyway, none of this even relates to my original post.
MS and ABK said when they started their talks, and it was a handful days after he sent this mail. Sony and Bungie also mentioned when they started their talks and it was months before tthat. Sony started to talk with Bungie before MS started to talk with ABK, this is another fact.
You continue tonpost irrelevant shit. And? This is like me saying Bungie was a response to Bethesda, because one factually happened beforehand. 🤪

The 100M MAU combines all CoD games, but comes obviously mostly CoD Mobile and Warzone. The yearly CoD games sold each between 20 and 30M copies after their lifetime, so obviously can't have 100MAU themselves.

Uh, obviously? What are you even rambling about this time? Why would Microsoft value CoD MaUs from a yearly release versus the franchise? That's not how anything works. Here you go again trying to desperately spin shit but falling flat on your face, as per usual.

MAU is important for MS for their press release notes and only mean amount of people active, even if without paying anything for it. MS posts MAU instead of other metrics which are more important like games sold, consoles sold, Gold subs, gamepass revenue, gamepass profitt or profit from their game division because to make them public wouldn't make them look good when compared against the competition. Because if they were proud of them tthey would show them

And there is your trademark insecurity complex showing itself again. It only takes a little to push you into spewing out your tales-from-your-ass fanfiction about what is really important for Microsoft and that really, deep down inside, they hide it by talking about MaUs (which BTW Sony talks about now and will continue to do heavily with their GaaS aspirations). Microsoft heavily linking MaUs for their games on Game Pass, which has most of its revenue generated from monthly subs and MaUs are a direct correlation to service success? LIES! 🤪 the real reason is because they're gonna look bad and are not proud 🤪🤪
I don't say the ABK acquisition is a response to the Bungie acquisition, I say it's possible it could be a reaction

Already addressed, and your fanfiction is still just as pathetic as it was earlier lmao

I have a lot of friends and former coworkers in dozens of studios and I ofter hear about acquisitions -not these two- before they are announced.

LOL, sure Jan.😉

You really just pulled an "my uncle at Nintendo" card?

If something, they could have affected them to want to close and announced it fast (maybe this is why they did pay such premium for it), before Sony announced the Bungie deal. But obviously they are two very different scales, and someone doesn't rush to spend $70B because being butthurtted.

It's extremely much more likely that Sony were in deep negotiations with Bungie, despite Bungies high demands, and the ABK acquisition came out of left field therefore Sony rushed to finalize that transaction. This, actually, has been hinted and is far more credible then your bullshit. Also, LOL at "butthurtted." Your venacular, yikes..

Oops. In this case call Jimbo and tell him to buy Tencent

Sony cannot afford Tencent, lmfao. Tencent would be the one buying Sony. And aside from that, China would never let Japan own one of their companies. Too bad other people started making fun of you on this before I did 🤣🤣 You need to change your name to SonyFanfiction.
 
Still Waiting Reaction GIF by MOODMAN
 
Yea Sony is totally getting chummy with the company that exposed their lack of a refund process.


I guess you forgot just last year how much dirt Epic threw on Sonys name like exposing the way they tax F2P games and withheld crossplay amongst many other things, and yet they still threw a billion dollars at them

Companies aren’t people with feelings. If an acquisition makes sense for them those things don’t matter.
 
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I want to see more acquisitions from both MS and Sony. The more unique content on both platforms, the more each one becomes attractive to invest in.
If I game on Xbox, and the only difference is one or two games a year that are exclusive then what am I really missing out on? But if there is say 7 exclusives I like every year on PS, then I will get a PS even earlier than I planned on.

Sony should look at the following.
1. Sloclap
2. Level 5
3. Sumo Digital
And of course Square.
 
Realistically, Deviation games, Firewalk (x Probably Monsters), maybe Arrowhead or Emberlab. Another support studio that already does a good amount of work for them like White Moon Dreams.

Nothing else is realistic at all
The Bungie acquisition wasn't something similar to most acquisitions they have been doing.

Talking about realistic makes no sense right now.

Bethesda wouldn't be realistic even for MS 3 years ago. Activision wouldn't be realistic even after 2021 ended.

The sky is the limit right now and Sony knows there's bigger companies trying to secure their place in the industry. It's now or never.

Sony acquired more studios since June last year than during the 15 years before that. A year ago you wouldn't believe this...
 

yurinka

Member
See, this is why Sony fanboys like you have popular content creators make fun of them weekly on YouTube and get paid to do so. All fanboys say stupid shit from time to time, but the level of delusion and desperation emanating from your posts are seriously insane.
What are you even rambling about this time?
Here you go again trying to desperately spin shit but falling flat on your face, as per usual.
And there is your trademark insecurity complex showing itself again. It only takes a little to push you into spewing out your tales-from-your-ass fanfiction about what is really important for Microsoft and that really, deep down inside,
and your fanfiction is still just as pathetic as it was earlier lmao
You really just pulled an "my uncle at Nintendo" card?
You need to change your name to SonyFanfiction.

Ok, another time insulting instead of politely providing facts to back points or proving other people wrong in a civil way. Goodbye, I'll add you to the ignore list to don't waste more time with you.


Let me get this straight, popular leakers like Jez, Jeff Grubb and Tom
These 'insiders' had some stuff right (part of them simply copy pasting what other one said before) and a lot of stuff wrong. What they say it's a rumor at best, can't be stated as fact something they say.

yet implying Microsoft bought ABK as a response to Bungie is not fanfiction?
I didn't imply that. Go read my posts, I explained it multiple times.


Here you go again. What are you talking about? You know what independent is referring to, given Bungies history and the official press release by Sony and Jim himself. But you have to find a way to desperately fit in "Sony is the owner and Sony is the boss and they allowed" into dozens of your posts for some reason.

You do this while ignoring the above, ignoring Bungies history with independence and ignoring this is extremely unusual for Sony to do and doesn't fit with their usual modus operandi. The main reason Bungie remains independent the way they are positioned and will continue to publish all their future games on "rival consoles" is due to Bungie and their stipulations, not Sony. Sony is a company that paid extra money to moneyhat Destiny's DLC for a second year to be off Xbox, lmao. Anyway, none of this even relates to my original post.
I repeat it because it's a fact and you don't seem to understand it or don't want to accept it.
 
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yurinka

Member
I want to see more acquisitions from both MS and Sony. The more unique content on both platforms, the more each one becomes attractive to invest in.
If I game on Xbox, and the only difference is one or two games a year that are exclusive then what am I really missing out on? But if there is say 7 exclusives I like every year on PS, then I will get a PS even earlier than I planned on.

Sony should look at the following.
1. Sloclap
2. Level 5
3. Sumo Digital
And of course Square.
Tencent owns Sumo.

As I remember Level 5 did shut down their NA office, not sure if they are in a good shape now. I think they are very talented, but I don't think they would fit strategically on Sony's plans. Even if I like their games, their sales may be too small for Sony and their active IPs (outside Ni no Kuni or ) are often more attached to Nintendo than to Sony. But who knows, maybe if cheap they have some PS2/PSP/PS3 brand they could revive with money, turn PS exclusive a few "important" 3rd party mostly Nintendo exclusive IPs (I think Sony wouldn't be intersted on it, they are too small for them and doesn't like to piss off fans with this) or they could get extra budget for a bigger and better JRPG with an art style similar to Ni no Kuni.

But who knows, I'm not convinced. I think Level 5 may be too niche/Japanese focused for Sony. Like many other Japanese companies Sony shifted their focus to games with a more global appeal than to games that are mostly country specific titles, which is where I see Level 5, even if I see potential there.
 
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Infamy v1

Member
Ok, another time insulting instead of politely providing facts to back points or proving other people wrong in a civil way. Goodbye, I'll add you to the ignore list to don't waste more time with you.

These 'insiders' had some stuff right (part of them simply copy pasting what other one said before) and a lot of stuff wrong. What they say it's a rumor at best, can't be stated as fact something they say.

I debunked your fanfiction and FUD, and it seems you finally relent and accept it. Good for you. But lol @ you squeezing in that Jez, Grubb and Tom get most stuff wrong and say rumors at best. Why lie on an enthisiast gaming forum for all to see? You sink deeper and deeper with your desperation at spreading FUD and it's hilarious, albeit sad.
 
Tencent owns Sumo.

As I remember Level 5 did shut down their NA office, not sure if they are in a good shape now. I think they are very talented, but I don't think they would fit strategically on Sony's plans. Even if I like their games, their sales may be too small for Sony and their active IPs (outside Ni no Kuni or ) are often more attached to Nintendo than to Sony. But who knows, maybe if cheap they have some PS2/PSP/PS3 brand they could revive with money, turn PS exclusive a few "important" 3rd party mostly Nintendo exclusive IPs (I think Sony wouldn't be intersted on it, they are too small for them and doesn't like to piss off fans with this) or they could get extra budget for a bigger and better JRPG with an art style similar to Ni no Kuni.

But who knows, I'm not convinced. I think Level 5 may be too niche/Japanese focused for Sony. Like many other Japanese companies Sony shifted their focus to games with a more global appeal than to games that are mostly country specific titles, which is where I see Level 5, even if I see potential there.
Mother fucking Tencent. Those flogs are everywhere.
Sony have grabbed most of the independent studios that they a strong connection with. It's harder to see the natural fits now.
I see alot more on the MS side of it now. Asobo, Avalanche and Certain Affinity to name a couple.
 

Pfroebbel

Member
While it would be best for Sony to aquire Square Enix (many great IPs and Studios) I also want them to have at least one West RPG Studio. I really want them to get CD Project (before MS aquires the last good West RPG Studio)
 

CrashFistfight

Neo Member
Arc System Works, Ember Labs, Impulse Gear, Deviation, Probably Monsters, and Kojima all are a good fit for one reason or another.

Konami games division, CDPR for its wrpg, and NightDive to start working that back catalog for remasters and remakes.
 
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