In a revolutionary turn of events, Microsoft has announced the acquisition of ZeniMax media for a reported sum of 7.5 billion dollars. ZeniMax is the parent company to a number of critically acclaimed high profile game publishing houses, including Bethesda Game Studios. The studio, that has given the gaming community chartbusters like the genre-defining Elder Scrolls series, Fallout series, the Dishonored series, Doom and the beautiful art piece that is the Wolfenstein franchise, is set to be a prized addition to the Xbox banner.
Subsidiary publishing houses, Roundhouse Studios, Arkane Studios, Tango Gameworks, Machine Games, and Alpha Dog are all set to make the move under the Microsoft umbrella.
Head of Xbox, Phill Spencer, in a blog post made on the company’s website, has welcomed the ‘talented’ teams of the acclaimed video game studios to Microsoft.
The head of the company has expressed the organization’s jubilation and excitement surrounding the acquisition and has promised complete creative freedom to the teams in their endeavors of making more genre-defining titles.
With the release of the next-generation Xbox and Playstation right around the corner, this acquisition could potentially give Microsoft a slight upper hand over its rival Sony, as this deal would allow Xbox to add a variety of exclusive titles to its ranks, which has been Play Station’s entire game plan. In a news story before, one of our writers had mentioned how ‘exclusives’ was Sony’s playing card, while power was Xbox’s. With this acquisition, the scales might just have tipped in Microsoft’s favour.
The exclusivity of game titles have been something that has been debated a lot within the gaming community in recent times, with Playstation commanding a lion’s share of exclusive game titles, and Xbox clearly falling behind. But this 7.5 billion dollar deal could put an end to all debates and help bridge the gap in exclusivity.
The enthusiasm of the Xbox head was matched by SVP of PR and Marketing for Bethesda, Pete Hines, who in a blog post made on the company’s website has highlighted exactly why Microsoft and Bethesda are a perfect fit. The blog takes an emotional route as Hines explains his 21 years’ worth of journey with the company, through which the organization has grown to the stature it is right now, and how with 34 years of constant reshaping and remodeling, Bethesda has grown and became the entity it is right now. Through the blog, Hines assures ardent fans that the company will still be the same after the move, and possess the same outlook towards video games, continuing to reshape the videogame topography of the world.
This move will also have Bethesda titles become available on Xbox Game Pass, something that is seen as a huge win for the Microsoft owned company as Bethesda games are hugely popular amongst the masses, and having them on the cloud platform could generate large traffic to the subscription-based system.
Microsoft now with 23 studio teams will look to make a strong contention for the center stage as its next-generation console system, the Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S is all set to be released on November 10th, with preorders opening on September 22nd.
