Microsoft’s acquisition of ZeniMax Media was due, at least in part, to the company’s desire to buy out the company starfield for Xbox, putting it out of Sony’s reach. Xbox CEO Phil Spencer said so during the Federal Trade Commission hearing to temporarily stop Microsoft from acquiring Activision Blizzard.
Spencer claimed that competitors – Sony Interactive Entertainment, for example – paid to keep games off the Xbox platform. Final Fantasy 16, which was released this week, is one of them, he said. Sony also had a deal with Bethesda Softworks. Ghostwire: Tokyo
“ZeniMax is a great example,” said Spencer. “When we acquired ZeniMax, one of the triggers was that Sony had struck a deal death loop And Ghostwire and effectively paying Bethesda not to release those games on Xbox.”
Spencer added that there was a need to “secure ownership” of ZeniMax and starfield to keep up the number of new games coming to Xbox. “We can’t be able to be a third-place console where we fall even further behind in our content,” he said.
Microsoft acquired ZeniMax in September 2020; The $7.5 million deal was completed in March 2021. Both death loop And Ghostwire: Tokyo were released as PlayStation exclusives after the Microsoft takeover, but death loop eventually came to the Xbox Series X in September 2022. starfield will be released on September 6th exclusively for Xbox and Windows PC. That said Bethesda publishing director Pete Hines on Thursday starfield is “irresponsibly large” and that releasing the game on other console platforms would certainly have delayed the game.
“As someone who’s played it a lot and sees all of the things that need to be done,” Hines said, “there’s no question for me that being able to focus on less-to-be-supported platforms and less-to-be-supported hardware is a big one Advantage for us was “this team.”
Spencer became the second Xbox executive to attend Friday’s FTC hearing, after chief financial officer Jamie Lawver. Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley sealed the courtroom from all of Lawver’s testimony due to confidentiality. The case continues Friday with recorded testimony from Sony’s Jim Ryan and testimony from Google Stadia’s Dov Zimring. The FTC expects Judge Corley to temporarily block Microsoft from acquiring Activision Blizzard. Your decision will determine whether the deal remains on hold until the ongoing FTC case is resolved.