The CMA and Microsoft agree on one thing: the cloud gaming market is what matters | Opinion

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In the end, it wasn't really about Call of Duty. It wasn't even really about PlayStation, no matter how much some people want to try to spin this as a console war narrative.

The biggest setback to Microsoft's bid to buy Activision Blizzard – a setback that could quite possibly sink the deal entirely – came largely from an interpretation of Microsoft's own beliefs and logic.

Microsoft, perhaps more than any other company, believes fervently that cloud gaming is the future of this industry. The UK's Competition and Markets Authority's ruling blocking the Activision acquisition is largely based on taking Microsoft seriously on this point – making a ruling based on protecting competition and innovation in a market in its infancy that both the CMA and Microsoft believe will grow to dominate the business landscape in years to come.

This ruling is a product of a very specific timeframe: if Microsoft had tried to make an acquisition of this scale in the games sector five or ten years ago, it's likely that it would have sailed through regulatory scrutiny in every major market with only a few light-touch remedies demanded for consumer protection.

That's because five to ten years ago, the conversation would have been solely about the console market – and if we look only at the console market, the arguments for blocking the deal are very weak. Microsoft trails both Sony and Nintendo, and is severely outgunned by both of its platform holder rivals in terms of successful, high-profile exclusives.

Allowing it to buy Activision Blizzard could actually have made the console market more competitive in the medium to long term – some guarantees about not