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Sony thinks it can’t compete without Call of Duty. That’s the long and short of an enormous 20-page document it’s submitted to the UK government, as it seeks a block on Microsoft’s proposed buyout of Activision Blizzard. One argument that’s been suggested is that PlayStation can just make its own first-person shooter instead, but the Japanese giant reckons the series is irreplaceable.
It’s probably a good moment to point out that Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 took less than a week to make a billion dollars, so we don’t think Killzone will be posting those kind of numbers any time soon. In fact, PlayStation used the example of Battlefield to illustrate its point to regulators – and it was pretty brutal with its comments on the EA published brand.
“Electronic Arts – one of the largest third-party developers after Activision – has tried for many years to produce a rival to Call of Duty with its Battlefield series,” the manufacturer wrote. “Despite the similarities between Call of Duty and Battlefield – and despite EA’s track record in developing other successful AAA franchises (such as FIFA, Mass Effect, Need for Speed, and Star Wars: Battlefront) – the Battlefield franchise cannot keep up. As of August 2021, more than 400 million Call of Duty games had been sold, while Battlefield had sold just 88.7 million copies.”
To be fair, Call of Duty releases on a more regular cadence than Battlefield, which generally hasn’t received an annual instalment. Sony would argue, however, that the fact Activision Blizzard is able to put out a hugely successful Call of Duty every single year is yet another example of why the series is irreplaceable. Poor ol’ Battlefield, though, eh?
[source assets.publishing.service.gov.uk]
Comments 74
It’s just the truth to be fair. Don’t think EA are under any illusions either.
Why do they need to replace a franchise that will continue to be available on playstation?
yes sony must continue to make 30% out of other peoples work
how dare anyone affect our profits
I think the phrase "harsh but fair" is appropriate here.
Sony’s very blunt description of Battlefield is like when you go to your Nan’s for tea and she tells you you’ve got bags under your eyes and you need a haircut lol well thanks Nan, tell me how you really feel.
This reminds me of WW2. The governments allowed Germany(Microsoft) to take too much territory for free and now they have become a danger to world piece looking to avenge the humiliation of WW1(Xbox1).
It's like Sony is doing a massive wheelie on cod and a strange bunny hop on battlefield, I like them both for different reasons 🧨🎖
Weren't EA talmbout Microsoft gobbling up COD was an opportunity for Battlefield to thrive if the deal went through just a few months ago 😭
I never get this argument that Sony "should just make their own FPS" Sony's point always was that nothing matches CoD for yearly revenue. And one of the reasons for that is because it's on a lot of platforms.
At the end of the day Sony want one of two things.
1. Stop the deal, so Activision's IPs stay on PlayStation while blunting Game Pass.
2. Failing that Sony get conditions in their favour that means CoD stays on PlayStation forever or at least making sure it doesn't go on GP day one.
Ultimately I think Sony are trying to stall things long enough for them to get there own deals done because while this is going on MS's hands are tied.
Find it kinda dumb the point that Sony just bought bungie, BUNGIE, was never brought up. This point is way more damning than throwing battlefield under the bus, especially when that franchise has been on the decline for a while.
@Somebody they don’t but they’re absolutely flapping it about losing exclusive and timed content that they’ve been paying for for years and losing out on that sweet sweet 30% cut from everything COD.
@Hindenburg you’re right, this situation is exactly the same as World War 2.
@uptownsoul
They threw it under the bus, ran it over, put the bus in reverse, and then backed over it. Multiple times.
@kyleforrester87 I know right? I always thought that history repeating itself is something that 15 years olds say to appear deep, but.. here it is.
@kyleforrester87
The rampant death, destruction, and war crimes in this fight between Sony and Microsoft are a close match for World War II lol.
In all seriousness though, forcing someone to play Battlefield 2042 should be classified as a war crime at this point.
I don't see this as throwing Battlefield under the bus. They're just stating the facts.
There's nothing harsh in it and I doubt EA will bat an eyelid.
@AdamNovice I think your last paragraph is exactly it.
Sony are working behind the scenes. They always are. They'll want MS busy with this for as long as possible so they can do whatever they are doing. Have had this thought myself a few times now.
@Hindenburg
dang bro I understand people’s dislike of Microsoft but are you seriously comparing them to the… historical state that shall not be named?
Didn't know Sony prioritized money this much. Guess we won't be seeing Killzone ever again!
@stinkyx tbf to Sony though… when news of the acquisition first broke, retailers were putting out signs warning prospective buyers to consider their PS5 purchase. I couldn’t give two hoots about COD personally but it is a pretty big deal. And you just can’t trust MS. They say one thing now but they’re known for backtracking after the fact. COD fans will be grateful Sony is fighting this.
@Fenbops
It’s all about it being on game pass day one with exclusive extras and dlc.
If Xbox actually advertised it correctly they can almost make it look exclusive as well.
That's a fair comparison and by no means throwing it under the bus. It's a way to illustrate the point they're making. The second biggest fps with a long history can't compete with COD. Nothing can. Simple as that. No need for clickbait titles.
@ItsBritneyB_tch
Can you really trust any multibillion/trillion dollar corporation?
They are all snakes at their cores. Including Sony. And I love Sony products. I own a bunch of them.
But let’s not act like they are somehow morally superior to Microsoft. They’ve done their own dirty deeds in the past.
@ItsBritneyB_tch the kind of honesty only old people can get away with without seeming mean 😂
@OrtadragoonX yeah, not saying Sony are saints but they’re right on this.
@MrMeeeseeeks I do wonder sometimes when she invites me round for a ‘roast’, if she’s actually talking about dinner lol
@Dezzy70 yep which is pretty much what Sony do now.
COD is always going to sell big but EA should just make BC3 at this point to bring fans back in all honestly.
Well they aren't wrong.
@Fenbops
Yes what Sony do now with COD and FIFA advertising wise. You can’t blame them it’s clever advertising.
Microsoft can do the same if they had not let the deal they had with FIFA and COD go to Sony.
Microsoft had that deal years ago.
And Microsoft can advertise what they have now but they don’t, they are effortless at the minute.
Microsoft could do so much more to promote their console, game pass and games. They only have their own lacklustre effort to blame.
@Somebody Because they believe that many COD players will either jump ship or choose to purchase an Xbox over PS5 once they realize that they can just subscribe to Gamepass, as opposed to buying the game every year. They also think that Microsoft will offer better advantages and exclusive modes, gear, characters, etc. to their version to sweeten the deal even more.
@Hindenburg so are you calling Microsoft na... Nevermind
@Fenbops they would still get that 30% for any of the games or content sold on their store.
And blocking this deal doesn't mean that Sony will keep the marketing deal they have. Once it expires Microsoft could just outbid them on the next one and spend the rest of the 70 billion elsewhere.
I find it so interesting how similar people not in the know think Battlefield is to COD. I get they are competitors in the shooter market but other than the fact that they are both military shooters they really couldn't play any more different from each other.
Sony does have a point here though. COD has released many safe but polished games in the series that has generated a huge following. Battlefield on the other hand has struggled to release an entry not in dire need of patches at launch. It's tough to get a community behind your product when it feels like the game is barely holding together.
@AdamNovice I don't think this is true. I am thinking exactly the opposite. I think Sony thought this deal would have been struck down by regulators already. Sony already claimed they would be making much more acquisitions this year....and simply haven't. It's obvious they have been talking behind the scenes. The most obvious of these is Square Enix, whom have been making a ton of exclusive content for PlayStation the past 2-3 years. They are all but first party at this point in name only. At a valuation of between 2-3 B, Sony can easily close this deal, but seem to be waiting until after the regulators decide on ABK, since it would hurt their case by acquiring a publisher.
Just my two cents on the matter. When ever this matter is resolved, however it is resolved, Sony will have a few acquisitions announced thereafter.
Microsoft didn't come up with COD, it's always been multiplatform. If they own it and decided to restrict or licence it to other platforms then it's a bad thing for players.
@Fenbops Timed exclusivity wasn’t a problem when XBOX had it on the 360 generation but it is now Sony has the upper hand. Sony has the biggest gaming platform at the moment with PS4/PS5 generations. All the digital storefronts basically take a slice for games to be on their stores, Steam, Nintendo and XBOX are no different. Only Epic takes a smaller cut.
@Fishmasterflex96 Bungie was bought for $3.9 Billion. Bethesda was bought for $9.7 Billion. You can’t even put Bungie on the same level as Bethesda let alone Activision which is costing nearly 20x more.
@Rols I still don’t think it’s a problem, it is what it is. When the company paying millions of dollars for exclusive content then starts moaning that the competition may take that away and do the same, then it’s laughable. That’s all.
Why would Microsoft pay billions for Activision? What is the benefit to them? They can negotiate Game Pass deals without buying the studio, so it's not that.
Well, look at their purchase of Bethesda. Look at what they're doing there (honoring agreements already in place, but then promising exclusives after that), and Microsoft basically said "Duh, why did you expect us to do anything else?"
Listen to them. Why would you expect them to do anything else with CoD? They'll make it an exclusive as soon as they can, which is why they want to make pinky promises to continue to release it on Playstation, and not binding agreements with regulators as a condition of the deal.
@Rols when we are talking about first person shooters being exclusive on Xbox when Sony owns one of the largest active fps franchises and one of the most important fps studios it’s more than fair to bring it up. Yes comparing of the acquisitions is not an equal playing field but this specific point Sony brought up is dumb as ***** and hurts their care extremely.
Sony do have a point. If you could just knock out a FPS that rivals call of duty then Microsoft could just do it instead of spending such an insane amount on the leader.
@Fishmasterflex96 Bungie are staying multiplatform so totally irrelevant.
Microsoft is buying up entire publishers then making the previously multiplatform games exclusive to them. That's the problem and it's pretty simple to understand.
It's funny how people think it's really about call of duty or that people going to move to xbox just bc duty is dayone, the subscription cost more than a game and with the cost of the console its more than just stay on PlayStation and buying cod every year.
I know about people who have gamepass and ps plus extra but still buying the games on ps.
@MackinsVII in their response they specifically talked about Xbox being the exclusive home of first person shooters on Xbox. Since Sony owns bungie, there is no way in hell PlayStation won’t at least have Destiny and the other fps games they are working on. That is the point in this specific article.
Sony seriously needs to just STFU ASAP. Talk about anything. Talk about Jim's cats. Literally anything. I never liked all these mergers but the more Sony goes on with these insane unprofessional, illogical rants that mostly call out their OWN bad business practices us PS customers have been upset with for some time, the more I start rooting for MS to devour anything and everything just to put them in their place.
Forget CoD and Battlefield. Smyths Toys are selling the PS5 version of Persona 5 for £21.99!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thing I don’t understand I get this is a massive game cod and Xbox are pretty much buying it
But PlayStation also have paid for silent hill final fantasy 16 and remake to be kept off Xbox.
I know they haven’t bought them company’s PlayStation but they have still paid to give consumers less choice but that’s seems to be okay and never brought up.
I own both consoles and would probably stick to Xbox only if they had the final fantasy games and the upcoming silent hill game.
CoD has been clawing it back since BF began to take a nosedive and EA began to singlehandedly crush their own reputation (shocker). If they'd maintained their BFBC2 glory they may have been riding high at this point. Alas...
@Hindenburg duuuude. Are you ok? How old are you? 97 (edit: not ageist, just in a sence " that old to remeber WW2 and how it was")? What on earth are you blathering on about?
@Somebody The problem is not COD being available on Playstation for 10 years. The problem is COD being free on Game Pass and getting a 80USD/EUR price tag on PS.
@Somebody because let's be realistic here MS are full of it and first chance they get they'll remove COD or release a version on PlayStation that is missing features and content. Remember when MS PAID to ensure that Xbox was the only version of COD to have features like splitscreen online.... Sony have paid for exclusive content before but I don't think they've ever paid for such gameplay features to be exclusive. It's exactly the kind of thing MS would do.
@stinkyx after the stinker that was shadow fall with the annoying drone touch pad gimmick and boring stealth no, i think you should know where sony stands now anyway when they think it's acceptable to charge 70 for tlou 1 when it's been released once already.
@Korgon battlefield hasn't played like battlefield in like 5 years what games are you playing because battlefield 5 and 2042 play nothing like battlefield, 2042 was supposed to be a warzone clone which got changed last minute, it plays more like MW2019 than any battlefield.
@extermin8or_ They kept survival mode off of Xbox in MW 2019 for the entire life cycle of that game that is bigger than splitscreen, majority of people don't even like splitscreen period if you go to reviews of the destroy all humans 2 remake you'll see people complain about it not having online co-op feature.
@Deityjester
I'll admit I haven't played much of the recent ones but i did try 2042' beta and have played CODMW2019. However the sheer size of the maps in Battlefield have always given it a different feel to COD's more smaller arena based maps. Plus you got all the vehicle combat and whatnot that just isn't in COD aside from one mode.
Yes, they are both FPS games but the flow of the game couldn't be more different.
@Deityjester Shadow Fall's drone was a neat idea but yea, I hated that thing and avoided using it. So frustrating that it wouldn't deploy the shield unless the ground was 100% unobstructed flat surface. The forced stealth level was trash, otherwise the hive-mind enemies made stealth pointless elsewhere in the game.
Multiplayer, tho...still a top 5 experience for me. Loved the class balance, map design, the fact it had spawn bases, etc.
@OrtadragoonX The only issue with MS is that they have more cash then certain countries.
@Meehanuk_1987 Yeah Silent Hill sells consoles are you serious now?
@Flaming_Kaiser
I agree. And I’m a firm believer in the old adage “absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
And in this world, money is real power.
I’m not saying they should forcibly broken up (because the same would need to be done to Amazon, Apple, and Alphabet, all of whom are relatively equal in size to Microsoft) but man I see some bad things happening in the future.
Imagine private corporations with private armies. Nation states can’t even fully handle that sort of responsibility (speaking of my own country, the Iraq War is a good example of our own failing in that regard).
Now imagine a mega corporation with that sort of power where the only motive is profit. It’s scary to think about.
Man I do not like COD that's the same game every year like FIFA, just put some money into Killzone, Resistance, or pull out your finger for something new.
@Flaming_Kaiser Not the point I was making
Final fantasy definitely does and silent hill was especially the remake of 2 will persuade some people to buy a ps5 and not an Xbox.
Amazing how news of a video game company being bought up leads to comments on WW2 and private corporate armies. 🤣
Sony are just embarrassing themselves on a weeklbasis with the Acti/Blizz situation now.
Grow a pair Sony and either compete, buy more or invest more but for the love of God please stop whining like a little bitch.
@Meehanuk_1987 I know but we both know which one as a company will make you more happy.
@OrtadragoonX Lets hope that money wont completely ruin us in the future. I dont care if you are a big fan of capitalism.
But in the end we need a little controle to save us all. Communism or capitalism are the same in the end one big bad leader or one big bad company its all the same in the end we are all screwed if one rules us all.
@Flaming_Kaiser
I’m a believer in capitalism with morality attached.
Unfortunately that isn’t happening now. And it’s only getting worse.
There has to be some oversight. Because the allure of pure profit is at the point where people are destroying their own morality to achieve it.
Call of duty appeals to casual gamers that are teenage boys mostly, I'm sure they could make something appealing enough for that market if they wanted it's not like that audience are gaming connoisseurs.
@Flaming_Kaiser I think in about 3 or 4 years when gaming engines start to integrate AI we will start to have a Renaissance with small teams being able to create very high quality games made in modern engines like UE5 and etc. Shortly after this happens these mega studios will be worthless because they won't even be able to make enough money to keep the lights on because of their enormous running costs.
@OrtadragoonX The problem with kapitalism that there is no incentive to change for the better. Doing horrible things seems to pay of way to good for kapitalism.
@Flaming_Kaiser
The other alternatives haven’t proven to be any better unfortunately.
Communism is a nightmare. Pure capitalism is a nightmare.
Lite socialism mixed with capitalism seems to be the best way but it has its flaws. No system is perfect unfortunately.
@OrtadragoonX What we have in Europe is something i like not to much power for companies thats why i dont want TTIP with the US because that will deliver us the US nightmare.
@Flaming_Kaiser
I very much envy your anti-monopoly and consumer protection laws.
That’s something I’ve wanted the US to do my entire life.
But those lobbyists man… they’re a different breed here.
@OrtadragoonX We have the VVD in the Netherlands the one and only for the big companies. Energy tax for the normal big corp cheap energy, extra tax for water the biggest wasters pay nothing. So it's not all that great but with a lot of different politic groups no one can totally dominate and thats the saving grace it's not a winner takes all thank God.
Just played the new Battlefield on GamePass earlier today. I put about an hour in before I uninstalled it. Not my cup of tea!
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