PlayStation Signs 10 Year Deal With Microsoft For Call of Duty

gameranx.com:

At long last, PlayStation has signed a deal with Microsoft to keep Call of Duty on their platform, after Microsoft finalizes their acquisition of Call of Duty owner Activision Blizzard King.

Xbox head Phil Spencer made the announcement himself on Twitter:

“We are pleased to announce that Microsoft and @PlayStation have signed a binding agreement to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation following the acquisition of Activision Blizzard.

We look forward to a future where players globally have more choice to play their favorite games.”

Microsoft President Brad Smith then quote tweeted Phil and shared his own statement on the news:

“From Day One of this acquisition, we’ve been committed to addressing the concerns of regulators, platform and game developers, and consumers.

Even after we cross the finish line for this deal’s approval, we will remain focused on ensuring that Call of Duty remains available on more platforms and for more consumers than ever before.”

This is the culmination of a process that took over a year now, when Microsoft and Activision first announced their plans to merge.

Sony would emerge to be one of the greatest opponents of this merger. Rather than take any direct legal action or make a public PR war about it, Sony decided to run to the regulators.

As is now well documented, Sony would talk to the CMA, EU, and FTC, sharing their arguments for why the deal should not be allowed to go through, and mainly pushing the console theory of harm.

At the same time, Sony would occasionally publicly respond to certain developments or revelations in the course of regulators investigating the deal. It should be noted that unlike Microsoft, Sony did not pay for any advertising to convince the public to side with them.

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