The FTC secured an oath under oath from Phil Spencer at the Call of Duty question and answer session.
The FTC has bombarded Phil Spencer with numerous questions, with the Xbox boss staying casual, according to eyewitnesses (like Florian Mueller and others) who were present in the courtroom reported.
The FTC then got serious and tried to increase the pressure on Phil Spencer with the following question:
“Can you swear under oath that you can promise to ship Call of Duty on PlayStation without looking at the terms?”
Here, the FTC lawyer probably wanted to get a clear no to support the injunction, but Phil Spencer took all the wind out of the regulator’s sails:
“That’s my goal, yes. If you want to suggest that Sony could change the terms of publishing games on our platform, then that would ban us from shipping on their platforms.”
So as long as Sony would allow Microsoft to bring Call of Duty to PlayStation with Activision Blizzard, it will. However, Sony could not demand release strategies that would not be feasible on its own platform.
The FTC also asked why the contract for Call of Duty on the PlayStation is different than standard Sony contracts and again Phil Spencer clarified that it is not Microsoft’s fault that the contracts are different, but the high standards of Sony itself is owed:
“Sony requires significant commitments…although we do know how to ship games on PlayStation, which we do on a regular basis.”
After that, the FTC couldn’t think of more than to replace Call of Duty with other game names and then wanted concessions of any kind for individual video games. After this back-and-forth, Judge Corley stepped in and said, “You’ve made your point, drive You go.” – interrupting the FTC’s questions.
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