Bethesda, iD, and some of the most important video game sagas are already owned by Microsoft. Are their games in danger on PlayStation consoles?
Microsoft buys Bethesda for $7.5 billion
Last September, Microsoft announced the purchase of Bethesda for $7.5 billion. But such a major transaction cannot be closed privately. The antitrust authorities in the United States and the European Union had to give the go-ahead.
After studying the case for months, today the European Union has approved the operation, as it does not pose a threat to free competition, since there are other “powerful players” in the video game market, according to the report. The United States has already accepted the deal some time ago.
Microsoft thus takes over such important studios as Bethesda itself and its acquisitions: iD, Arkane, MachineGames, and Tango Gameworks.
These companies have created some of the most important sagas in the history of video games, including Doom, Skyrim, Fallout, Dishonored, Wolfenstein, and many others.
Now that Microsoft owns them all, many gamers are wondering what will happen to future PS4 and PS5 versions of Bethesda games.
Microsoft has already confirmed that the first thing it will do is to integrate these companies’ games into its Xbox Game Pass and Project xCloud service, which is currently more important to it than the Xbox X Series console itself.
It has also confirmed that it will respect the exclusivities it had already signed with Sony for some PS5 games, such as Deathloop and GhostWire: Tokyo, according to The Verge. Ironically, these games will be owned by Microsoft but will only be released on PS5… Although after the exclusivity period, we will surely see them on Xbox and PC.
Satya Nadella’s company has also committed to respecting agreements and editions, and online games like The Elder Scrolls: Online will continue as before.
But what happens with new games not yet released, such as Bethesda’s long-awaited Starfield, or The Elder Scrolls VI, will be seen on a “case by case” basis.
Phil Spencer, head of Xbox, is not a big fan of exclusives, and that’s why in recent years all Xbox games are released on PC on the same day, something that did not happen before.
We can take for granted that future Bethesda games will be released first on Xbox X Series, Xbox Game Pass, and PC. They will probably have a few months of exclusivity, and from here, it cannot be ruled out that they will also be released on PS5, as the games of other companies bought by Microsoft, such as Mojang and its Minecraft, already do.
