Microsoft is definitely ready to do anything to afford Call of Duty, even if it means looking like an idiot.
It has been almost a year since Microsoft announced its intention to buy the famous studio Activision Blizzard for around 70 billion dollars. If you thought money was everything, that statement couldn’t be more wrong for this transaction. It’s been 12 months now that the firm has been fighting to prove to the world that buying Activision wouldn’t break any anti-monopoly rules. mainly concerning the franchise Call of Duty.
To secure its business Microsoft is ready for anything. After repeatedly reassuring PlayStation players by offering a 10-year contract to Sony and by even offering to integrate it with PlayStation Plus, the company is adopting a radically different strategy. Facing the Federal Trade Commission, Microsoft and Xbox representatives claim not to know the release date of Call of Duty.
Surprising coming from a web giant. A simple Goo… Bing search separates the firm from this information, so why pretend not to know it? This news comes from a new document supposed to plead in favor of Xbox who wants to minimize the impact that Call of Duty could have on other platforms, the PlayStation consoles in the line of sight.
Call of quoi ?
The aim is therefore to inform the commission in charge of anti-competitive cases that “Microsoft does not have sufficient knowledge or information to form an opinion on the veracity of claims regarding the industry’s perception of Call of Duty and the initial release date of Call of Duty, or the veracity of claims regarding the launch of Call of Duty and its typical release schedule, as well as the resources and budget Activision allocates to Call of Duty, including the number of studios working on Call of Duty.”
A whole lot of information therefore which is currently being used to prove that Call of Duty represents a huge financial part of the video game industry. This technique, although ridiculous, could still work even if one doubts that taking the authorities for pies is a good idea. Microsoft may buy time if it doesn’t get more credibility in this case.