After receiving the green light from the financial authorities, Microsoft announced that today it has officially completed the acquisition of ZeniMax, the family of studios that includes Bethesda, Id Software, Arkane and more. An immediate news: more Bethesda games will arrive on the Xbox Game Pass this week. Distant news: some future Bethesda games will indeed be exclusive to PC and Xbox.
“This is the next step in building a team of industry-leading studios, a commitment we have to our Xbox community,” said Xbox chief Phil Spencer in today’s announcement. “With the addition of Bethesda’s creative teams, players should know that the Xbox, PC and Game Pass consoles will be the best place to try new Bethesda games, including some new titles in the future that will be exclusive to Xbox and PC players.”
Exclusivity is a problem that Microsoft has discussed previously. They planned to stick to previous PlayStation commitments, but suggested they could consider exclusivity for others, or at least timed exclusivity. Now, huh, yes, definitely some planned scloosies – although it is unclear when this will start, or with what games. Bethesda Game Studios has The Elder Scrolls 6 coming, as well as a mysterious new Starfield space game, and the Bethesda family has a lot going on.
It’s a shame. I don’t have any PlayStation or Switch, but I’m not going to hope that Microsoft will once again miss the platform barriers that have been somewhat reduced in recent years. I see why this can be good for Microsoft and the Xbox, but I think it is bad for video games.
Microsoft is paying $ 7.5 billion for Bethesda. They are probably buying higher profile games from Microsoft, even above Minecraft devs Mojang ($ 2.5 billion in 2014). Other studios acquired in recent years include Double Fine Productions, Obisian Entertainment, Ninja Theory and Playground Games. We must always remember the dangers of industry consolidation. Not even four years have passed since Microsoft closed the Fable devs Lionhead.
“Now that we are a team, we can start working together in the future that lies ahead,” added Spencer. “We will have more to share about what’s coming for our teams later this year. In the meantime, to properly celebrate this special moment, we are bringing additional Bethesda games to the Xbox Game Pass later this week.”
No word yet on what we will see. Go ahead, put Daggerfall on the Xbox Xeriex X Game Pass and let them find out.