The acquisition of Activision Blizzard is in even greater danger than before, the Union is worried about Call of Duty.
We never thought we would write this sentence:
The European Union is officially worried about whether enough gamers can play Call of Duty freely.
Brussels has officially sent an antitrust warning to Microsoft, detailing what EU competition experts say are the dangers of its planned acquisition of Activision Blizzard. It is not known exactly which body sent the letter, who signed it, and what exactly it says, because the document is not public, but it probably reads, which has been voiced for some time: they are afraid that if the company (more precisely, Xbox) buys the giant publisher, it will create an unprecedented monopoly situation, in which the Call of Duty series may even become platform-dependent.
Politico, which reported on the warning, also spoke to Microsoft: as they said, they are still “committed to finding a way for the business”, and they take the EU’s arguments seriously and are sure that they will be appeased.
The head of Xbox, Phil Spencer, told the American IGN the same thing earlier: he said that he had traveled and negotiated a lot in the past year, got to know the logic and arguments of the competition authorities, and overall it is good for the video game industry that there is a discussion about this. In this way, the authorities “get to know the gaming industry, how the business is doing, who the players are and what the Xbox team wants”.
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