Category Archives: microsoft

Down Goes Activision! Bought by Microsoft for nearly $70B

For an extensive look at the glorious early years of Activision, have a read of my article, here: https://thedoteaters.com/?bitstory=console/activision

Microsoft has a deal to buy long-time video game company Activision, to the tune of $68.7 billion. That’s a lot of CoD Points! Looking back at the history of Activision, there’s a certain amount of schadenfreude in them being finally snapped up themselves. Through the years, the company has done a fair bit of acquiring of their own. For example:

In 1997, they acquired Raven Software, makers of the Heretic FPS games. With Raven closely associated with Doom and Quake makers id Software, this eventually gave Activision an in with id itself. Raven was eventually eviscerated with targeted lay-offs, and as with many dev teams within Activision, is now part of the Call of Duty factory.

Neversoft, makers of the Tony Hawk skateboarding games, got picked up in 2000. It was shuttered by Activision in 2014, its remaining team members redirected to… you guessed it… cranking out Call of Duty games.
Speaking of Call of Duty (which you do a lot of when it comes to Activision), developer Treyarch was drafted into Activision in 2001. Which marches us to…
Infinity Ward had made Medal of Honor: Allied Assault in 2002, and was subsequently picked up by Activision in 2003. They would, of course, be the impetus Call of Duty developers. Activision switches between Infinity Ward and Treyarch as lead designers of each new version of CoD.
Grey Matter Interactive (ne: Xatrix Entertainment) had a deal with id to make Return to Castle Wolfenstein in 1999. With id’s close relationship with Activision, Grey Matter ended up gobbled up by them in 2002. Spoiler Alert! They ended up merged with Treyarch to make Call of Duty games! Surprise!
RedOctane made their name by pairing with Harmonix to make the Guitar Hero games. After being purchased by Activision in 2006, they were spared the ignominy of having to toil away on the Call of Duty rockpile by being closed down in 2010.
There’s few long-standing developers as creative-minded as Toys for Bob, started by Paul Reiche III (the Archon games with Freefall Associates, Mail Order Monsters) and Fred Ford in 1989. After making the first two successful Star Control games (we don’t talk about Star Control 3), they found huge success with the Skylander games, marrying real-life figurines with video games. Picked up by Activision in 2005…. do I really have to say this… they’re put to work on Call of Duty games in 2021.

And of course, there’s the big one, when Activision merged with Vivendi, owners of World of Warcraft makers Blizzard Entertainment, to form Activision Blizzard in 2008.

So, when it comes to Activision these days, to paraphrase The Dark Knight: You either get shut down as a developer, or live long enough to see yourself working on Call of Duty games. In the above list, there wasn’t one description of a developer acquired by Activision where I didn’t also have to include the title Call of Duty! That’s what Activision has become: a Call of Duty factory. Game developers are bought, their talent steadily stripped away, and often eventually shuttered or absorbed. It’s a long way away from the initial vision of Activision, that of under-appreciated game designers lifted out of the enforced anonymity of Atari and allowed to take wing as gaming superstars.

For an extensive look at the glorious early years of Activision, have a read of my article, here: https://thedoteaters.com/?bitstory=console/activision

Microsoft Does a 180 On Xbox One DRM

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Microsoft’s DRM scheme for their next-gen Xbox One was announced at the just-passed E3, and the hue and cry against it by gamers quickly followed. Nobody wanted a console that needs to phone home over the Internet to Microsoft servers every 24 hours to keep access to all your games, online or off. Nobody wanted onerous restrictions on the loaning, trading or selling of used games. Nobody wanted anything to do with Microsoft’s new order.

Still, Don Mattrick, President of Interactive Entertainment Business at MS, stated in interviews that the new rules would hold no matter what, and anybody who didn’t like it could stick with the Xbox 360. Tweet responses from the Xbox Support Twitter feed echoed this. Even in the face of merciless ribbing by competitor Sony on how their next-gen PS4 wasn’t having any new DRM added on, Microsoft held firm with their new gaming paradigm.

Until now.

Mattrick has posted on the Xbox blog that they are completely reversing course and dropping the new DRM from the Xbox One. An Internet connection will be required only when first setting up the system, and not required for one second longer than that to play offline games. Also, there will be no limitations on the trading or purchasing of used games.

It’s a perfect example of the power of the Internet, the very channel that MS wanted to use to keep tabs on all their consoles. Instead, via social media vectors, the DRM of the Xbox One was dissected, and all ramifications exposed. Of course, Microsoft paints this as a “You spoke. We listened.” situation. Well, we definitely spoke.

Hopefully their memory is as good as their hearing.

source: Giant Bomb

3 Reasons the Xbox One Is So Scary

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Is Microsoft showing us the future of gaming?

In preparation for an upcoming Bitstory article, I’ve been gaming a lot on my Nintendo NES. And when I want to, I can just take a cartridge and slide it into the front of the machine and, you know, play a game.

Nintendo was the first game company to do DRM, but it wasn’t a hedge against consumer misuse of their products. It was made to control the whims of the developers of games for their systems, a way of controlling the quality and pace of game releases so that the market didn’t become glutted with inferior products for Nintendo game machines and thus avoid the shakeout that felled the entire North American video game industry in 1983-1984. When you gained licensee status for the NES, Nintendo would manufacture your cartridges, and during the process the company would put a key chip into the circuitry, which would communicate with the 10NES chip inside the console and allow the game to be loaded. In this way Nintendo controlled what made it into their games ecosystem.

DRM or Digital Rights Management these days are restrictions on what users can do with digital product, be it movies, games or anything else. It’s nice to be able to insert a cartridge into the NES after 30 years and play it unfettered. With Microsoft’s next-gen console Xbox One, this ability could literally become a thing of the past.

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The Good Old Days

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How Microsoft used to handle DRM.

Source: reddit

Sony Drops the Hammer On Microsoft at E3 2013

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The Electronic Entertainment Expo, or E3 as the hep cats like to call it, is underway in Lotusland. It is here where game makers flaunt their upcoming wares to industry insiders, and this year the show has a particularly keen edge due to the unveiling of the next generation consoles for Sony and Microsoft that will hit the market later this year. Yesterday, the stage at Sony’s E3 press conference was awash with a series of uncannily wise moves by the company.

It’s exciting for a video game historian to watch as a new generation of game consoles is unveiled, as so many have been before. For sure, we all want to find out about the specs under the hoods, and about the new games that will use all that fancy tech to bring new experiences to our screens. New IPs are marvelled at, and continuations of old favourites are warmly welcomed. Amid endless sturm and drang, systems and games are paraded across giant screens to the accompaniment of driving soundtracks amid flashy stage lighting, all designed to get a rise out of the crowd. The biggest audience reaction, however, came during the Sony E3 conference. For a lot of people, E3 2013 was Sony’s show to lose, after Microsoft had unveiled their new console, the Xbox One, earlier in the day. The reason? Not a lack of hardware specs on the new Xbox’s part. Not a dearth of exciting games.

No, the talk of MS having already fumbled this next video game console cycle comes because of the draconian DRM system for the Xbox One. While video games may not stir passions quite as much as Mel Gibson’s famous speech in Braveheart, the people in the audience watching Sony explain the lack of any extra DRM on their machine, and likely those around the world watching the live stream, were standing and cheering their freedom. The freedom to trade in, buy and play used games without additional fees. Freedom from being denied the ability to play your games, even in single player mode, if you lose your internet connection or otherwise can’t authenticate your honesty with a company’s servers. The freedom to sell or lend your legally bought game to a friend. They may take our free multiplayer, but they’ll never take our FREEDOOOOOOOOM!!!

Oh SNAP!

Even President and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment of America Jack Trenton seemed suprised at the visceral reaction of the crowd. The other devastating broadside Sony launched at MS towards the end of the conference, that the PS4 will be $100 cheaper than the Xbox One, was the only other announcement that got a similar response. It goes to show that while gamers want the latest and greatest in games, they also want the ability to play those games. Without onerous restrictions.

In this day and age, with the twisted type of “free market” capitalism we’ve grown accustomed to, where there never seems to be anything approaching a level playing field, there always seems to be fair amount of industrial collusion going on. This time, though, Sony is not playing ball. They came on strong at E3 with a big FU to DRM, and I think Microsoft just got Xboned.

Here is video of Sony’s E3 2013 press conference. The fireworks start at 1:24:24.