“The acquisition also bolsters Microsoft’s Game Pass portfolio with plans to launch Activision Blizzard games into Game Pass, which has reached a new milestone of over 25 million subscribers. With Activision Blizzard’s nearly 400 million monthly active players in 190 countries and three billion-dollar franchises, this acquisition will make Game Pass one of the most compelling and diverse lineups of gaming content in the industry. Upon close, Microsoft will have 30 internal game development studios, along with additional publishing and esports production capabilities.” - January 18, 2022 | Microsoft News Center
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The Battle.net brand is too recognizable to ditch. Blizzard tried that once already and it fell flat damn near instantly. It’s highly unlikely MS tries to do that, which would effectively neuter Blizzard’s portfolio.
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Hopefully not, as I’d rather not have to go through any of Microsoft’s stuff (for example, Microsoft store) just to play some blizzard games.
I hope they do not forget us PC gamers.
“Mobile is the largest segment in gaming, with nearly 95% of all players globally enjoying games on mobile. Through great teams and great technology, Microsoft and Activision Blizzard will empower players to enjoy the most-immersive franchises, like “Halo” and “Warcraft,” virtually anywhere they want. And with games like “Candy Crush,” Activision Blizzard´s mobile business represents a significant presence and opportunity for Microsoft in this fast-growing segment.” - January 18, 2022 | Microsoft News Center
What will probably happen is a slow transition. There will be the Xbox links to Battle.net. Then it will merge to the Xbox + Battle.net. And finally it will just be Xbox.
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I would not be surprised if they did away with Battlenet and the forums.
“one thing we have been looking at is whether we move community conversations off forums for those titles and more onto other platforms such as Reddit or Discord (an example).”
Whatever they decide i hooe they hurry up about it… tbh i got other games to play so whatever Blizzard.
Yeah I’m not sure about the whole mobile market. I have an iPhone 11 that’s starting to overheat whenever I play certain games. I wonder how phone hardware is going to be taken into account. Phones are going to have to become like mini laptops.
They probably should ditch the Xbox for PC app and move gamepass to Battlenet. That app really is horrible.
Anyway, most likely, both will coexist.
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I’d argue a lot of mobile games are overshooting the average specs of phone owners out there that’d even be interested in playing. Basically, if you’re running a device with 64gb of storage and less than 4gb of RAM, you probably won’t be able to play anything launched within the past year without huge stability issues if it actually tries to push 3D or higher end L2D graphics. Meanwhile, even if a phone does meet specs, or even exceeds, there’s no guarantee the company behind the game has optimized their game to minimize hardware strain. Then there’s obvious brand favoritism where more resources go toward the Apple side, leaving Android versions unplayable if you don’t have very specific phones.
I was looking forward to Windows 11 and its Android API, but after trying it and finding it worse than emulators currently out there, on top of making W11 itself crash randomly, it quickly became a hard pass from me.
Frankly, the mobile market needs to settle down on pushing the graphical envelope, because hardware isn’t where eyecandy tech dudebros want it. Doubly so with all the parts shortages going on thanks to miners and pandemic blah.
Me too.
But we may be seeing ourselves out the backdoor before too long.
LOLz. Battle.net brand is going down for sure. The Metaverse is coming.
Perish the thought…
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I believe Starfield is next.
The next Cyberpunk. Or, that is not fair at all to Cyberpunk, at least that was half-decent.
I sure hope these companies are not throwing too much money at the metaverse thing (spoiler; they are).
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But do you know why? I have a spoiler for you: AI.
Not sure how you connect those things in your head. Throwing money at AI is not a waste. Well, some of it is of course, but not overall.
Metaverse and AI are not related.
LOLz. A lot of laugh today besides the good news. I have to go cook some meat for dinner.
I think yes, everything will transist to the Windows Store. Makes sense for Microsoft and Xbox Gamepass.
Battle.Net will merely be a component of some other service such as GamePass.