US senator slams Sony's "monopoly" on Japanese games, gets slammed right back

gamesradar.com:

A US Senator has accused Japan's government of allowing Sony to get away with "blatant anti-competitive conduct" through "exclusive deals and payments to game publishers", claiming that's partly why Sony has a "monopoly" on the high-end game market on its home turf. It's the latest chapter in the console giant's public feud with Microsoft over its attempt to purchase Activision Blizzard, and it's led to a collective online 'huh'in response.

As Politico (opens in new tab) reports, as part of a recent Senate finance committee hearing, Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell criticised Sony's "monopoly" control of the high-end gaming market before calling on a trade representative to press Japan on the issue.

"I'm told that Sony controls a monopoly of 98% of the high-end game market, yet Japan's government has allowed Sony to engage in blatant anti-competitive conduct through exclusive deals and payments to game publishers," Cantwell says.

Cantwell goes on to accuse Japan's Fair Trade Commission of failing to investigate these "exclusionary conducts" before asking a trade representative what can be done to address these issues better and "create a level playing field with the [Indo-Pacific Economic Framework] on something as important as this issue?" The answer given, in short, is that it's being looked into.

Now, there are a few things to unpick here. When Cantwell refers to "a monopoly of 98% of the high-end game market", that doesn't include Nintendo, PC, or mobile. Last year, America's Federal Trade Commission coined the 'high-performance console' market definition (opens in new tab), which can essentially boot Nintendo from conversations between PlayStation and Xbox. It can make the framing of specific discussions feel