Before Microsoft can incorporate Activision into its already extensive portfolio of video game studios, the transaction must be approved by the Federal Trade Commission and the U.S. Department of Justice. According to Microsoft, the procedure might take anywhere from 12 to 18 months.
At $68.7 billion, it is a massive deal, and gamers all across the world are wondering what it means for those firms and the industry as a whole.
Meanwhile, it's attempting to preempt one of the most important issues regulators may have: whether or not it will make Activision's key titles unique to the Xbox, rendering them inaccessible to other platforms such as Sony's PlayStation.
"Microsoft will continue to make 'Call of Duty' and other popular Activision Blizzard titles available on PlayStation through the term of any existing agreement with Activision," Microsoft president Brad Smith wrote in a blog post published on Wednesday. "And we have committed to Sony that we will also make them available on PlayStation beyond the existing agreement."
Additional details are scant, but "Call of Duty" will continue to be released on Playstation for the next three years, according to the rules of Activision's existing deal with Sony. With Smith's statement, it appears like a new agreement, or at the very least a standing policy, of keeping the series multiplatform for the foreseeable future, is in the works.
Activision Blizzard is now owned by Microsoft, but the deal is set to finalize in the summer of 2023. Because "Call of Duty" games are now released on a yearly basis, there may be one or two new Call of Duty games released before the acquisition is finalized. So any major adjustments to the Activision Blizzard franchises may take some years before Microsoft can make them.
Microsoft's acquisition of one studio after another has been compared to Disney, and some are concerned that a monopoly is growing (though it's worth mentioning that Sony and Tencent remain larger companies in the game industry).
Similarly, with "Call of Duty" having been a successful multiplatform product up to this point, the question of what would happen to it now persisted. Fortunately, Microsoft has recently responded to that question.
Having said that, it appears like Microsoft is doing everything it can. Given the charges against him, many have criticized the company's choice to keep current CEO Bobby Kotick on until the deal closes. Perhaps once Microsoft gets total control, it will cause a major upheaval. Fans of "Call of Duty" and gamers around the world will have to wait and see.
