A year and two days ago, on Oct. 13, 2023, Microsoft completed its acquisition of Activision Blizzard, marking a significant milestone in the gaming industry. This acquisition brought two industry pioneers together to create new opportunities for innovation and to promote a competitive landscape that benefits players and game developers alike. After careful review by numerous international regulators, resulting in commitments to the European Commission and UK Competition and Markets Authority ensuring the preservation of competition, the deal closed. The FTC stands alone in its continued opposition to the acquisition.
As we reflect on the past year, it’s clear that the industry has faced economic challenges that required us, like others, to make difficult decisions for our business and teams. But together, Microsoft and Activision Blizzard are helping fuel growth in the industry. At the one-year anniversary mark, we look back at ways we’ve worked to contribute to a more vibrant and competitive market and how we’ll continue to focus on this work moving forward.
Bringing choice to more players and accelerating cloud gaming
Our goal is to bring the joy and community of gaming to players wherever they play. True to our commitments, Call of Duty remains on other platforms and is available in more places on the same date and in more ways than ever.
As the industry works to improve the cloud gaming experience, ensuring players can access their favorite games seamlessly will be critically important to cloud gaming’s overall growth and success. Yesterday, we welcomed a new era for streaming games—while Ubisoft now owns the cloud game streaming rights to Activision Blizzard games, pursuant to a licensing deal, Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III and Call of Duty: Warzone will be available on Xbox Cloud Gaming for the first time, joining other Activision Blizzard games which have become available to stream via cloud gaming services as part of our commitments to regulators. Activision Blizzard and Xbox games are already available to stream on Boosteroid and NVIDIA GeForce NOW, enabling more flexibility and choice for players.
Over the last year, we’ve also worked to find more ways to bring Activision Blizzard and Xbox games to players, wherever they play. Beloved Activision Blizzard titles were added to Game Pass for the first time, including Diablo IV, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III, Overwatch 2, and Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy, with more titles such as Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 coming on Oct. 25 and StarCraft: Remastered and StarCraft II on Nov. 5. Through a renewed publishing agreement with NetEase, Blizzard is also bringing back its iconic universes like World of Warcraft, Overwatch, Diablo, and StarCraft to players in China. Additionally, Xbox titles have been made available on PlayStation and Nintendo Switch, with Sea of Thieves joining three other Xbox titles in the top 10 bestselling games on PlayStation. As we look ahead to 2025, players will also have access to Indiana Jones and The Great Circle on PlayStation.
Supporting industry innovation and growth
Everything we’ve done to make more games available in more ways helps game developers create new revenue opportunities. Our focus on creating a multi-device platform at multiple price points provides opportunities for games to build even bigger communities. While developers focus on their visions, we create the pathways between the game and its global audience across multiple devices and business models. We launched the most affordable console on the market this generation, the Xbox Series S at $299, and with Xbox Game Pass, we enable players to access a library of games for a monthly price, with a range of plans to choose from.
We currently have more games in development from third parties, including independent developers, than at any time in Microsoft history—and every platform benefit Microsoft builds for our own games, we offer to our third-party partners and independent developers. This enables a future where third-party developers, big and small, can compete to win the hearts and minds of gamers.
Advancing accessibility and inclusion
Ensuring that players feel safe, seen, heard, represented, and valued is critical to the growth of the gaming industry as a whole. Over the last year, we made significant strides in providing more accessible experiences with our hardware and within our games. We’ve launched new controllers like our adaptive joystick, adaptive thumbstick toppers, toggle hold features, and accessible packaging. As part of Microsoft, Activision Blizzard has continued its commitment to fostering more inclusive online gaming communities. In the year since welcoming Activision Blizzard, we’ve also found new ways to deliver for players in games—for example, Call of Duty partnered with Microsoft’s Project Acoustics system to feature audio accessibility options, including asymmetrical hearing compensation.
Our work doesn’t stop there as we continue to innovate to make gaming accessible, more inclusive, and more fun for hundreds of millions of players around the world. We are actively creating new solutions and best practices that can be leveraged across the entire gaming industry based on our learnings and tools.
Looking ahead: more opportunities for innovation and competition
As we look ahead to next year, there is so much more ahead for Microsoft and Activision, Blizzard, and King as we work to bring more choice and innovation to the mobile gaming market. Last week we announced that players will be able to both buy and stream Xbox games via the Xbox app on Android beginning in November, and we are looking forward to sharing more with our players and partners in the coming weeks.
We believe that what we’ve done over the past year shows definitively that our intent is not just to live up to the commitments we made during the acquisition, but to go beyond what they require. Despite the FTC’s assertions over the past year, our commitment is and will continue to be to bring more games to more people in exciting ways, help the industry unlock more opportunity, and enhance competition for the benefit of all.
Thank you for being part of this journey with us. We look forward to continuing to bring you the best gaming experience.