GrubbSnax 30: Microsoft Acquires Activision Blizzard

Put that yummy in my tummy

This was a real good Grubbsnax.

Since I worked there (left in 2012), Microsoft has approached almost everything they do as "second to market". It sometimes works and sometimes doesn't but they never go halfway once they choose to invest.

I wonder if there’s any sense amongst regulators if pursuing the “monopolizing the live service gaming submarket” would potentially bear more fruit. Apologies if this addressed later in the video, I just got to the part discussing reactions around the industry and other companies panicking about MS having more leverage on service partnerships in the future.

This is on YouTube. How is it Premium??

This was a fantastic show! Glad to see the Hock Doc made an appearance.

@dryker: Looks like this one is free on the site as well, so my guess is they thought a lot of people would be interested in this topic and opened it up for everyone.

@jeffgrubb: Thanks for your insight on this!

One of the few rational voices discussing the Acti aquisition. Great as always.

(seriously, so much games press talking nonsense unable to separate their understandable emotional and ethical opinions on this from the cold hard business of it)

@jeffgrubb for real though, this air compressor kicks ass. Digitally set the desired PSI, turn it on and it auto-shuts off when it gets there.

I'd love a new transformers game

@budgietheii: I think it's perfectly rational for games press to raise the obvious ethical questions around this deal (questions that Microsoft itself knew full well it was provoking, if it's true that part of the reason the deal isn't set to close until summer of '23 is that they're expecting a fair bit of scrutiny from regulators). I agree that Jeff's analysis here is clear-eyed and valuable, and I think he does a great job of laying out his perspective, and explaining why he isn't as concerned about consolidation as others are. But I hardly think it would be fair to say that those others, who hold very understandable concerns about more and more industry control resting in fewer and fewer hands, are "talking nonsense."