What does Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision mean for PlayStation?

The gaming world is still in shock after the recent announcement of Activision Blizzard being acquired by Microsoft. While the deal won’t be finalized until 2023, it certainly raises a lot of questions. Most importantly, what does this mean for the PlayStation community?

Phil Spencer, CEO of Microsoft Gaming, has confirmed that it plans to continue offering Activision Blizzard games for PlayStation consoles, as well as creating Xbox-specific content. So does Sony need to retaliate with their own acquisition, or are we all just pretending like nothing happened?

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What does the Activision Blizzard acquisition mean for PlayStation?

When Microsoft bought ZeniMax Media, owner of Bethesda Softworks, in 2021 for $7.5 billion, it didn’t take long for Sony to announce that it had acquired Fabrik Games and Bluepoint Games.

Of course, the acquisition could have been done long before Microsoft announced their purchase of ZeniMax, but that makes us wonder if Sony plans to buy other developers in the near future. .

Sony could splurge and buy a publisher like Rockstar Games, but is it really worth it? As mentioned before, Microsoft doesn’t have any intention of stealing titles from the PlayStation community, as a Microsoft representative clarified by saying:

“Activision Blizzard games exist on multiple platforms today, and we plan to continue to support those communities in the future. The acquisition is intended to increase the availability of Activision Blizzard content on more platforms, including mobile”.

The acquisition will of course create more competition for PlayStation, as more and more titles will be added to the ever-growing Xbox Game Pass service. But there are rumors that PlayStation is in the process of creating their own Game Pass-style service, which will likely be announced in the coming weeks or months.

In fact, the only thing fans can expect to see a change is the plethora of Activision Blizzard titles entering the Xbox Game Pass as well as the Xbox Game Pass. Call of Duty and the PlayStation marketing deal is likely to end. This means small perks like PlayStation having a one-year exclusivity on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019) survival mode will no longer exist, among other things.

Before Call of Duty and PlayStation teamed up in 2014, Activision’s popular FPS series had an exclusive agreement with Microsoft. Back to the days of Call of Duty map packs, Xbox users can purchase the new DLC one month before PlayStation users. Apart from these kinds of deals, we don’t expect big titles like Call of Duty made an Xbox exclusive.

As noted by CharlieINTEL on Twitter, Microsoft will lose a significant amount of profit if they remove Call of Duty from the PlayStation console. Year after year Call of Duty remains the title of best-selling PlayStation of the year, which would have turned Microsoft away with a lot of money.

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If you’re a die-hard PlayStation fan, you shouldn’t worry about Microsoft acquiring Activision. Not only is the agreement not valid for another year, but Phil Spencer and the Microsoft team seem dedicated to keeping the entire gaming community happy, no matter what platform you play on.