A few days ago, rumors swirled that Sony CEO Jim Ryan held a meeting with European Union antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager. But those weren’t rumors, as Microsoft’s head of communications came out to confirm the news and accuse Sony of lying to the EU about dealings with Call of Duty and PlayStation.
In a Twitter thread posted yesterday by Frank Shaw, Microsoft’s head of communications, he jumped on the subject and shows that Sony is lying in its meetings in Brussels. Apparently, Jim Ryan said the deal allowing the Call of Duty franchise for 10 years on PlayStation consoles is something Microsoft won’t actually achieve. Which is completely false, since it is a concession presented to various regulators and, mainly, to Sony.
Kicked drowning, Sony seeks to stop Activision buy with lies
We remember that Sony is the company outside of the purchase that has tried the most to block everything from meetings with European regulators to statements that seek to directly condition the purchase. While they have a significant and recognizable fear about one of the industry’s biggest franchises leaving their consoles, they hint that this is a deal they really care about and will hurt them.
For this reason, and in view of Jim Ryan’s alleged conversations and lies in Brussels, Microsoft’s communications manager came out to say the following:
I heard that Sony is informing the people of Brussels that Microsoft is not willing to offer them Call of Duty parity if we acquire Activision. Couldn’t be further from the truth.
We made it clear that we offered Sony a 10-year contract to give them parity in time, content, features, quality, gameplay and all other aspects of the game. We also said that we are happy to make this enforceable through contracts, regulatory agreements or other means.
Sony is the market leader in consoles and it would defy business logic for us to exclude PlayStation gamers from the Call of Duty ecosystem.
Our goal is to bring Call of Duty and other games, like we did with Minecraft, to more people around the world so they can play where and how they want.
The strategy is not just to put the game on PlayStation, but to really expand its distribution and bring games of this style to all competitors. In both Nintendo and cloud gaming, Microsoft seems willing to expand its market to control an IP address and any revenue it receives in the future.
And while that discussion is still ongoing with EU regulators, Microsoft is preparing its case against FTC regulators. A few days ago we also learned that Sony would have been called by Xbox to testify as an argument to approve the purchase. Faced with this appeal, Sony continues to request the postponement of its response, which should now take place on February 1.
I hear Sony informing people in Brussels that Microsoft is not willing to offer them parity for Call of Duty if we acquire Activision.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
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— Frank X. Shaw (@fxshaw) January 28, 2023
