After Microsoft confirmed the news that it was going to acquire Activision Blizzard for $70 billion, the Xbox maker has confirmed that the publisher’s games sagas like Call of Duty The Warcraft they will arrive at Game Pass.
The exact date of when Activision Blizzard games will arrive on Microsoft’s subscription service hasn’t been announced yet, nor do we know exactly which games from the publisher will be coming to Game Pass. However, the purchase of Activision Blizzard implies the acquisition of franchises of the stature of Call of Duty, Starcraft, Diablo, Overwatch y Warcraft. And in its official announcement, Microsoft assured that it will “offer as many Activision Blizzard games” as possible for the PC and Xbox versions of Game Pass.
This includes new titles and “the games from Activision Blizzard’s incredible catalog”, so we will probably see the sagas of StarCraft Y Warcraft on PC as well as Call of Duty on both Xbox consoles and PC. It remains to be seen if the popular MMO World of Warcraft, who still asks a monthly subscription to players to access all of its content, it will be included in PC Game Pass in some way. In addition, other sagas owned by Activision Blizzard such as Crash Bandicoot, Spyro Y Tony Hawk now they might also reach Game Pass. In short, the service catalog is probably going to increase significantly.
This gigantic purchase, as you can imagine, will have long-term ramifications on the exclusivity of Activision Blizzard games. remember when Microsoft bought Bethesda for $7.5 billion in September 2020. Xbox head Phil Spencer said at the time that Bethesda games would be coming to other consoles “depending on each case” to later clarify in March 2021 that some games they will be xbox exclusives. There are “contractual obligations” to be met, Spencer said in March, but confirmed that future Bethesda games would be Xbox exclusives.
It seems likely that with Activision Blizzard’s acquisition, the publisher’s futures will also be exclusive to the Xbox ecosystem. Many of Activision Blizzard’s current games are cross-platform in these moments, What Call of Duty: Vanguard u Overwatch, but those that are currently under development, such as Diablo IV u Overwatch 2, they might abandon their cross-platform release to maintain their exclusive status, unless there are already “contractual obligations” that dictate that those games are going to be cross-platform.
Perhaps the clearest picture of Microsoft’s policy that can represent the future that awaits Activision Blizzard’s next games is that of the game Starfield. Although it had never been considered as a cross-platform title, there was a misunderstanding during Gamescom 2021 and everyone thought that the long-awaited sci-fi role-playing game was coming too to PlayStation consoles. However, that won’t happen., as reiterated by the vice president marketing of Bethesda, Pete Hines, in June 2021, already that Starfield will be 100% exclusive of Xbox.
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