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Tue, 16 Mar 2021

Even Murkier: Microsoft Says Some Bethesda Games Will Indeed Be Xbox, PC Exclusives
Furnished content.


Late last year, we discussed Microsoft's acquisition of Zenimax, the parent company of Bethesda, and what it would mean for the studio's beloved franchises. At particular issue, given that this is Microsoft we're talking about, was whether new or existing franchises would be exclusive to Xbox consoles and/or PC. The communication out of Microsoft has been anything but helpful in this respect. First, Xbox chief Phil Spencer and Bethesda's Todd Howard made vague statements that mostly amounted to: man, we don't have to make Bethesda games exclusives and it's hard to imagine us doing so. Only a few weeks later, another Microsoft representative clarified that while the company may have plans to make Bethesda games "first or best" on Microsoft platforms, "that's not a point about being exclusive." This naturally led most to believe that Microsoft might have timed release windows on other platforms, but wouldn't be locking any specific titles down.What a difference a few months can make, it seems. With the acquisition officially complete, Microsoft put out a "welcome" announcement to the Bethesda team, which included this fun bit to be consumed by the public.

This is the next step in building an industry-leading first party studios team, a commitment we have to our Xbox community. With the addition of the Bethesda creative teams, gamers should know that Xbox consoles, PC, and Game Pass will be the best place to experience new Bethesda games, including some new titles in the future that will be exclusive to Xbox and PC players.
This, frankly, is the worst of all worlds. The announcement is vague enough to not really give the public any actual idea of what games will be exclusive and which won't. Will it be new franchises developed as a first party studio, or are we talking about franchise mainstays like Fallout and Elder Scrolls? Nobody knows! In fact, all the public does know is that the exclusivity guillotine is hanging out there somewhere. And this drip, drip, drip change in the message to the public sure does make it look like Microsoft had this plan all along and only wanted to avoid a backlash in the public.A public that has caught wind of a worrying trend in the video game industry: consolidation. 2020, particularly in the second half of the year, saw a violent uptick in studio consolidation under the bigger players. With that consolidation comes a lot of control over distribution of titles and franchises, especially for studios that were acquired by the likes of Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony.
It's not just your imagination: the gaming industry is going through a period of consolidation unlike anything we've seen before. Market research firm DDM collected transaction data over the course of 2020 and found that:-Gaming industry investment reached a new high of $13.2 billion in 2020, up 77% from 2019.-M&A volume reached a new high of 220 deals in 2020, a 33% year-over-year increase.-Things really started heating up in the fourth quarter of 2020, when 75 M&A deals took place, nearly double the number of deals made in Q4 2019.
While some studios have begun to finally open up to selling across platforms, it's quite easy to see danger on the horizon with all of this consolidation. If the ability to distribute titles suddenly ends up primarily in the hands of a small number of corporate entities, we could see huge steps backwards in a return towards exclusive games, exclusive hardware, and the like. For an industry that has been speeding towards more and more revenue, this could be one hell of a speed bump.

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