Welcome back Xbox fans, geeks, retro gaming enthusiasts, fighting game enthusiasts and other gamers!
With the current Xbox-exclusive fantasy role-playing game Avowedcoming out on February 18, I’m supposed to be excited about what Team Xbox has prepared this year. Of course, there were disappointments not only with certain Xbox first-party releases but also with the way things have been changing on the part of Team Xbox.
Wow! That’s a collection of very fun and popular games Capcom released from 1993 to 2000. With the exception of The Punisher arcade game (a 2D adventure game), I played them all in the arcades decades ago and I can say that having them in a single collection for the modern Xbox consoles is indeed a blessing for long-time Xbox gamers who love 2D fighting games and retro gaming. The way I feel right now, Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics looks really enticing to purchase.
Marvel vs. Capcom: Clash of Super Heroes is not just a lot of fun to play but also will please those who love the characters. With Wolverine, Spider-Man, Venom, Captain America from Marvel’s side included, there is something that will bring both geeks and gamers together.
I have fond memories of Capcom 2D fighting games that carried Marvel’s intellectual properties. X-Me: Children of the Atom was enjoyable to play with and it resonated with me as I was already an X-Men comic book reader back in the 1990s. Marvel Super Heroes was also fun to play and it somewhat reminded me of The Infinity Gauntlet storyline. X-Men vs. Street Fighter was the most intriguing crossover fighting game at the time of its release and it really raised the bar for fast-and-furious style gameplay complete with a quick character swap during the heat of battles. Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter was the follow-up which came with changes that were not well received by the fans.
Then came the two Marvel vs. Capcom crossover fighting games which really built upon the foundation of X-Men vs. Street Fighter for more team battles with speed and impact in mind. I could not forget the inclusion of Resident Evil characters, Mega Man and others.
X-Men vs. Street Fighter is a classic tag-team, crossover-oriented video game! Fast and furious action ensured!
The Punisher arcade game is the only non-fighting game of the collection. Punisher fans should look at this.
Adding further zest to the collection is online play that allows casual matches, ranked matches, custom matches. Think about how your skills or your scoring will compare with those of other players from around the world.
That being said, Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics is a retro gaming package that deserves attention as it carries some of the finest video games Capcom ever made.
Welcome back, my readers, YouTube viewers and all others who followed this series of articles focused on YouTube videos worth watching. Have you been searching for something fun or interesting to watch on YouTube? Do you feel bored right now and you crave for something to see on the world’s most popular online video destination?
I recommend you check out the following topics and the related videos I found.
#1A look back at Tobal No. 1 – The 1990s will always be remembered as the decade when fighting games became wildly popular. While franchises like Tekken, Virtua Fighter, Street Fighter and The King of Fighters literally flooded the arcades and consoles, game developers at DreamFactory (a subsidiary of Square) were dissatisfied with the state of fighting games at the time and this eventually led to the creation of Tobal No. 1, one of the most unique games of its genre ever made. To learn more about it, watch the video below.
#2 Assorted videos of Air Force One (1997) – Watching Air Force One (starring Harrison Ford) on the big screen in 1997 was a fun experience for me. It was one of the many so-called Die Hard clones of the 1990s which featured one brave, vulnerable hero fighting terrorists while confined in a place where escape is not option. For your enjoyment, I selected one trivia video and a few reaction videos of Air Force One. As it is a great film, I encourage you to watch it first in case you have not seen it. Otherwise, go watch the selected videos below.
#3 Slope’s Game Room’s look back at the Choplifter series – I first played Choplifter on the Family Computer back in the late-1980s and it really was both unique and fun to play. It was a side-scrolling adventure game with military action but it was not an all-offense experience. In fact, the game gives you opportunities to rescue hostages and the game development history is pretty interesting to discover. As such, I encourage you to watch Slope’s Game Room’s retrospective of Choplifter.
#4 The games of Square in the 1990s remembered – If you know your video game history, Square Enix was established in 2003 as a result of a merger between Square (AKA SquareSoft) and Enix. When Square was still an independent, standalone company it released a lot of memorable games on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) and the PlayStation in the 1990s. If you love retro gaming and if you are interested to discover (or rediscover) what Square released back in the 1990s, then this video is for you.
#5 Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau receives response from returning US President Donald Trump regarding new tariffs – Justin Trudeau – the super woke and out-of-touch Canadian Prime Minister – told the returning US President Donald Trump that new tariffs would kill the economy of Canada. The result is a memorable response from Trump. To see what happened and how the public reacted, watch this Sky News Australia video. Lastly, never ever trust Trudeau. You will regret it believing in him as he is a very bad leader.
#6 Kamala Harris being hit by her donors and her fellow Democrats for reckless campaign spending – The defeated Commie Kamala Harris is now the target of her US presidential campaign donors and even her fellow Democrats. You see, her campaign team raised at least $1.5 billion and ended up with a debt of at least $20 million due to reckless spending and irresponsible handling of money. Apart from literally BUYING the support of celebrities and Hollywood Communists, the Harris campaign spent excessively on online ads, private jets and others. The donors are very furious and a lot of Democrats realized that the laughing hyena Kamala Harris severely damaged the political party. That being said, Kamala Harris would be delusional enough to actually run for US President again in 2028. Watch and learn from Sky News Australia’s video.
#7 You, Me and the Movies react to Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan – Years I ago, I posted my retro review of Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan. The 1989 Friday The 13th sequel was so sloppy and bad with its presentation, it sometimes could be funny to see and it’s okay to ridicule it. If you want to discover Jason Takes Manhattan without spending too much time, you should watch the reaction video of You, Me and the Movies.
8. The collapse of the Assad dictatorship in Syria – In case you missed the news, a new chapter in the history of Syria has officially started as the dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad officially ended with the Islamist rebels taking over the country. Assad and his family are now in Russia. While there is euphoria going on in Syria, you should not allow yourselves to be deceived because the civil war in Syria was never a case of “good versus evil”. Assad was allied with Russia and terrorist state Iran. Meanwhile, the Syrian rebels are allied with the Islamist Turkish forces, Jihadists, terrorists and they have Al-Qaeda members in their ranks. Syria now has a new beginning but where will it go? Watch the videos I selected for your viewing and learning.
Welcome back, my readers, YouTube viewers and all others who followed this series of articles focused on YouTube videos worth watching. Have you been searching for something fun or interesting to watch on YouTube? Do you feel bored right now and you crave for something to see on the world’s most popular online video destination?
I recommend you check out the following topics and the related videos I found.
#1Konami’s failed fighting games of the 1990s – Remember back in the 1990s when a lot of fighting games were released on the arcades and game consoles? Japanese game companies Namco and Capcom released a lot of memorable fighting games of different styles such as Street Fighter II, Tekken, Marvel vs. Capcom, Tekken 3, Soulcalibur, X-Men: Children of the Atom, X-Men vs. Street Fighter and so on. Sega released Virtua Fighter games while Midway released Mortal Kombat games, and SNK had Fatal Fury, King of Fighters and Art of Fighting games. Looking back at the fighting game craze of the 1990s, I noticed that Konami – best known for Metal Gear, Contra, Gradius and Suikoden – released their own fighting games but never achieved the tremendous success that its competitors had. The retro gaming video is a must-see.
#2 Calvin Dyson’s lengthy review of The World is Not Enough – I can hardly believe that it has been twenty-five years since the James Bond movie The World Is Not Enough was released in cinemas as the 20th century was ending. The 3rd film of Pierce Brosnan as Agent 007 received mixed reviews from the critics and some fans found it to be really brainless and excessive with action which negatively affected the cinematic narrative. To find out if the 1999 Bond movie aged well or not, YouTuber Calvin Dyson recently posted his lengthy retro review and you can watch it now.
#3 In-depth documentary of Smash TV – Remember way back in 1990 when Smash T.V. (also referred to as Smash TV) was released in the arcades and attracted a lot of players with its enjoyable game design and concept? The game was a hit and went on to be ported to many platforms afterwards, and I played its Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) version a lot. To find out how hit game started and who were the key people behind its production, watch the video documentary of PatmanQC now.
#4 Defeated Kamala Harris, Sharon Stone, Alec Baldwin and others highlighted in Lefties Losing It episode – It has been a few weeks since Donald Trump pulled off the greatest American comeback by winning again the US presidential election. Even until now, the Leftists are still agonizing over Trump’s victory and many of them cannot accept the reality of what happened. In the latest Lefties Losing It episode below, you will see a drunk-like Kamala Harris talking to her supporters, Sharon Stone bashing others and more. Watch it!
#5 Electric vehicles sparked into fire disasters as a result of salt water caused by Hurricane Helene – This news video should convince you not to buy and drive an electric car or any type of electric vehicle for that matter. Salt water touching the ion batteries of electric vehicles spark flame and this leads into fire incidents that simply could not be solved quickly. Hurricane Helene’s powerful wind brought salt water into affected communities and not even electric vehicles parked inside the garage were spared. Avoid electric vehicles and stick with vehicles that run on fossil fuel.
#6 Ashleigh Burton’s Fantastic Four (2005) reaction video – Back in 2005, I never saw Fantastic Four in the local cinema. I was never a Fantastic Four fan nor did the team-up of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby starting the said superhero team interested me. Believe it or not, I finally saw the movie on home video in 2009. In recent times, YouTuber Ashleigh Burton posted her reaction video of Fantastic Four and it is fun to watch.
#7 Phantasy Star IV retrospective – Thanks to my physical copy of Sega Genesis Classics, I was able to play Phantasy Star IV: The End of the Millennium on my Xbox Series X console. For the newcomers reading this, Phantasy Star IV was a sci-fi Japanese role-playing game (JRPG) released on the Sega Genesis (Mega Drive in other markets) in Japan in 1993 followed by released in America and Europe in 1995. The production side of the game has very interesting details and you can learn all about it in GTV Japan’s retrospective video below.
#8 A look at Disney’s The Black Hole – Long before the Walt Disney Company became the super woke entity of modern times, they released the expensive sci-fi film The Black Hole. As far as the Disney legacy is concerned, the 1979 movie is significant as it marked a serious change of direction the company took with its movies. Disney was already known for wholesome and family oriented movies and TV shows and eventually entered a period of uncertainty. The Black Hole was both Disney’s attempt to cash-in on the sci-fi and disaster film craze of the 1970s and attract more adult moviegoers. You can learn more about this forgotten movie by watching the videos below.
#9 Popcorn in Bed’s What Lies Beneath reaction video – I saw What Lies Beneath inside a crowded cinema here in the Philippines way back in 2000. Directed by Robert Zemeckis, the film was an inspired work of suspense and horror mainly told through Michelle Pfeiffer’s character. I still remember some comments of disappointment over Harrison Ford’s lack of screen time compared with Pfeiffer’s. Regardless, you have to see Popcorn in Bed’s reaction video right here.
Welcome back, my readers, YouTube viewers and all others who followed this series of articles focused on YouTube videos worth watching. Have you been searching for something fun or interesting to watch on YouTube? Do you feel bored right now and you crave for something to see on the world’s most popular online video destination?
I recommend you check out the following topics and the related videos I found.
#1Donald Trump’s decades-long journey to becoming US President – No matter what your political views are, there is no denying that Donald Trump’s incredible 2016 election victory as President of the United States was the culmination of a very long journey that started since 1980s. As Trump kept doing lots of business, he observed what went wrong in America, what the nation lost to other countries with regards to trade or diplomacy, why many ordinary Americans became forgotten, and more. Watch Trump’s journey in the video below.
#2 A look back at Street Fighter II V (anime) – If you are a long-time gamer like me, chance are, you must have played one of the many games of Street Fighter II. If you have played the games, were you able to watch the short-lived anime series titled Street Fighter II V? Loosely based on Super Street Fighter II Turbo, the anime series started in 1995 and was directed by Gisaburō Sugii who was responsible for the anime movie of 1994. I found two YouTube videos revisiting Street Fighter II V posted below for your enjoyment.
#3 Fox News interview shows Kamala Fit is too dishonest and too out-of-touch to be US President – If there is anything notable with the incumbent United States Vice President Kamala Harris – the one woke candidate the Democrats nominated after pushing Joe Biden out of the way – is that she has a very distorted view of reality and she is very unfit to become US President. Her recent interview with Fox News is the worst yet and the consequences are still being felt as I write this down. Watch the selected videos below to find out.
#4 A look back at Koudelka – During the late stage of the first PlayStation console’s life, Japanese role-playing games (JRPGs) became really popular with gamers in Europe and America. Back in 1999, the role-playing game Koudelka was released on PlayStation in Japan and an international release followed in 2000. That game did not achieve critical acclaim and was never a big seller. As many old-time gamers have forgotten about its existence, Koudelka’s production history is rather intriguing and surprising to discover.
Koudelka was developed by Sacnoth which was founded by former Squaresoft employee Hiroki Kikuta (Secret of Mana, Trials of Mana, and Soukaigi). To find out why Koudelka had an unusual RPG concept and style of gameplay, I encourage you to watch the retro gaming video below.
#5 More Iranians need Israel’s help – It is a fact that the Islamic regime of Iran has a long record of brutalizing Iranians who do not follow their evil moves. In short, the people of Iran are not their wicked government. That being said, the dissenting Iranians are reaching out to Israel for help in the form of military action against the evil regime. Watch the video of The 700 Club below. It includes statements from Iran’s Crown Prince Reza Pahlavi.
#6. George Romero was hired to make a Resident Evil motion picture – Back in the late 1990s when the Resident Evil game franchise really soared in popularity and became bankable for Capcom, a movie project was approved and the late George A. Romero (Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, Creepshow) was hired to write and direct it. It should be noted that Capcom hired Romero to make the Resident Evil 2 commercial which became very popular and contributed to the game’s big success. Eventually, Romero’s drafts of the script got rejected and Constantin Film replaced him with Paul W. S. Anderson resulting in the 2002 Resident Evil movie.
If you are fascinated with Romero’s short-lived involvement with the Resident Evil movie project, you should watch the related videos posted below…
#7. China’s Bonnie and Clyde – Have you been following the YouTube channel Dark Asia with Megan? Every week, there is always a new episode about true crime stories that took place within Asia and the host Megan is often great with her presentation and she clearly does a lot of research. Recently an episode about China’s very own Bonnie and Clyde was released. I saw it and it is very intriguing to watch. For the newcomers reading this, Bonnie and Clyde refers to real-life American bandits and serial killers who caused a lot of trouble from 1931 to 1934. Hollywood even released a movie in 1967 glorifying them. As for who exactly were China’s Bonnie and Clyde, and what had they done, I encourage you to watch Dark Asia with Megan’s episode below.
#8. Kamala Harris supporter shouts at toddler – Going back to the 2024 US Presidential campaign, a supporter of Communist Kamala Harris (the US Vice President since 2021) was caught on camera yelling at and traumatizing a toddler. I know for a fact that liberals, Leftists, Marxists, socialists and woke Americans can be quite wild but the die-hard Kamala supporter who screamed at the toddler clearly has crossed the line. It makes me wonder if the Democrats ever oriented their supporters to be civil and in control. Watch the Sky News Australia Lefties Losing It video below.
#9. Kamala Harris got booed at her own campaign rally! – The presidential campaign of Commie Kamala Harris is clearly failing not only because the opinion polls – most of which are Left-leaning and oversampling Democrat voters – are showing her falling further behind Donald Trump but also because unfortunate events have been happening at her campaign rallies. The new embarrassment this time is Harris getting booed at her own campaign rally! Watch the videos below.
Welcome back, my readers, YouTube viewers and all others who followed this series of articles focused on YouTube videos worth watching. Have you been searching for something fun or interesting to watch on YouTube? Do you feel bored right now and you crave for something to see on the world’s most popular online video destination?
I recommend you check out the following topics and the related videos I found.
#1John List true crime documentaries – In America, the late John List is one of the most notorious criminals ever in their history. At a very desperate point in his life, List murdered his own family members in 1971 and it took some time for the local authorities to find out what he left behind in their huge home. Having left his home and investigators behind, List traveled across the nation, came up with a fake identity and lived away from the law for almost twenty years. How the law enforcers tracked him down (involving America’s Most Wanted TV show) and arrested him is a great story to follow. All of these are documented in the two videos below.
#2 The Stepfather explanatory video by GoodBadFlicks – Believe it or not, the story of John List inspired the creation of the 1987 psychological horror film The Stepfather. This video by YouTuber GoodBadFlicks is a must-see.
#3 The assassination attempt on US President Donald Trump – I really cannot ignore the assassination attempt on US President Donald Trump which resulted in the injury on his right ear, the death of a campaign rally attendee and one other person getting injured. Whatever your political views are, this is a tragedy and it clearly was not staged. It was indeed an attempt to kill and already the Satanic Leftist mainstream news media are distorting the facts and lying to you. To get clear insight on what happened and who the suspect (a very young guy who was a registered Republican voter who also donated money to support Democrats and far-left movement), watch the selected videos below.
#4 HolyLandSite’s Mount of Olives video – Recently, the YouTube channel HolyLandSite published their newest video featuring the Mount of Olives in Israel. I personally visited some of the sites at the Mount of Olives featured in this video and in my experience, I witnessed the Holy Bible come to life and gained insight on what the place was like during the time of Lord Jesus. Mount of Olives was where Lord Jesus last stepped on before ascending into Heaven and He will arrive there sometime in the future. Watch the video below.
#5 Capcom’s failed case against Data East over Fighter’s History – Remember how popular Street Fighter II was in the arcades in the 1990s? Capcom made tons of profit from SFII which led to the production of sequels, spin-offs and other 2D fighting games that followed. Of course, as the fighting game genre became tremendously popular, there were other fighting games that competed with Capcom’s creations. Believe it or not, Capcom sued Data East alleging that their competitor’s game Fighter’s History infringed the copyright of Street Fighter II. To find out what happened, watch the video from Top Hat Gaming Man below.
6. Donald Trump nominated again by Republicans for President of the United States– By the time you are reading this, the 2024 Republican National Convention has concluded a few days ago. Donald Trump has been nominated again for US President by the party, only this time the Republicans are very united and they were reinvigorated arguably because of the failed assassination attempt on their candidate. The Democrats meanwhile are divided and already their powerful members stopped supporting the re-election campaign of Joe Biden. The contrasts between the two parties are so great during the last week. If you want to see all the Republican speeches and the nomination acceptance speech of Trump (whose running mate is US Senator J.D. Vance), watch the Republican National Convention (night 4) below.
Take note of Spencer’s words “existing agreements” and “our desire to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation.” Existing agreements most likely refer to what Activision Blizzard made with Sony which I believe are years-long deals on games with regards to platform releases, marketing, post-release downloadable content, etc. Of course, such agreements can last long but NOT FOREVER. The business benefit for PlayStation from Activision Blizzard will someday come to an end.
As for Microsoft’s desire for keeping Call of Duty on PlayStation, that clearly means that the corporation of Xbox is technically in-charge of not just the COD franchise but on the decision making, marketing and releasing its games on specific platforms. Sony and its PlayStation team are not in the driver’s seat here anymore. Whatever deals Activision signed with PlayStation before the acquisition will expire and they certainly will not be renewed once Microsoft and its Xbox team takes over. In due time, future COD games as well as other upcoming games and new intellectual properties of Activision Blizzard will become Xbox-exclusive in accordance to what Spencer declared before…
“We have games that exist on other platforms, and we’re going to support those games on the platforms they’re on. There are communities of players. We love those communities and will continue to invest in them. And even in the future, there might be things that have either contractual things, or legacy on different platforms, that we’ll go do. But if you’re an Xbox customer, the thing I want you to know is this is about delivering great exclusive games for you that ship on platforms where Game Pass exists, and that’s our goal, that’s why we are doing this,”
This brings me to my next point – Sony as a global business entity is way behind Microsoft, Apple, Google and Amazon when it comes to establishing ecosystems that result tremendous business growth and reaching billions of customers worldwide respectively. The decades-old console-focused approach by Sony with PlayStation was indeed successful but not great enough to help it grow big time. Not even their Hollywood business nor Spider-Man could lift them up greatly. The weird thing was that Sony in previous decades had established an old ecosystem before PlayStation began.
To put things in perspective, posted below is a long excerpt from a recent Nikkei Asia article. Some parts in boldface…
The 10% drop in Sony’s stock price this week following Microsoft’s announcement that it will buy game content developer Activision Blizzard shows the market has belatedly awakened to an existential flaw in Sony’s kingdom. It lacks an ecosystem.
In terrifying contrast, Microsoft is a formidable ecosystem whose component elements, such as devices, operating system, browser, search engine, applications, content, cloud memory, work hand in glove to suck in captive users and never let them go. The ecosystem effect is all too familiar to owners of PCs that run on the Windows OS, which maddeningly redirects users to Microsoft’s Edge browser and Bing search engine against their will.
It is no accident that five of the world’s seven largest companies by market capitalization — Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet/Google, Amazon and Meta/Facebook — are ecosystems. Every consumer decision to buy a device, be it a PC, smartphone, Kindle reader, or game console, entails a surrender to an interconnected ecosystem. Promiscuity among ecosystems is possible but, by design, not easy. The ecosystems are at war and want to make you their captive.
Ironically, Sony was early to recognize the strategic significance of the ecosystem effect. Its decision to acquire CBS Records and Columbia Pictures in the late 1980s was inspired by the notion that controlling entertainment content could somehow push device sales, such as Betamax VCRs and Sony Walkman.
What Sony overlooked was that it would be self-defeating to make its controlled content exclusively available on Sony devices. Very few consumers would buy a Walkman just because it was the only way to listen to Michael Jackson. And Sony’s refusal to license Michael Jackson to non-Sony device users would perversely shut down third-party royalty revenue from the controlled content. Sony saw, but misunderstood and misapplied, the ecosystem effect between devices and content.
Sony’s next, more costly, wrong turn was its failure to anticipate and keep up with the morphing of portable audio devices like the Walkman launched in 1979 and iPod in 2001 into the iPhone debuted in 2007. The iPhone integrated, in a single handheld device, all of the functions formerly provided by the multiple discrete products in Sony’s consumer electronics lineup: phone, TV, camera, video and audio player and recorder, clock, calculator, and so on.
Sony’s stock price plunged from 30,000 yen ($260) per share in 2000 to 1,668 yen in 2009. Sony and the entire Japanese consumer electronics industry are still in disarray from the iPhone paradigm shift.
Unlike Sony, Apple founder Steve Jobs was a master at creating and orchestrating an ecosystem. In particular, he understood when to link content exclusively to a device and, just as important, when not to. Even now, Apple’s iOS is available only on Apple devices, unlike Microsoft’s device-agnostic Windows OS.Initially, Apple’s iTunes music store platform was available only on Apple’s own devices. Then, in October 2003, “the day that hell froze over,” Jobs made the strategic decision to make iTunes compatible with and freely downloadable by non-Apple devices.
The result was not only to massively increase the audience and revenues of the iTunes platform. Non-Apple device users discovered how great iTunes was and that it worked even better on an iPod, leading to a surge in new iPod owners conveniently prepped for the coming transfiguration of the iPod into the iPhone.
The same interplay between devices and content is at the center of intense competition in the $180 billion global PC gaming industry. Dedicated gamers have a choice among three game-specific consoles — Microsoft’s Xbox, Sony’s PlayStation and Nintendo’s Switch.
The choice of device, in turn, entails a menu of device-specific exclusive content. Xbox and PlayStation each offer about 2,000 titles, but the bestselling 200-300 games for each tend to be exclusive to one or the other. A gamer’s choice of console implies a decision about preferred content.
But the relationship between game devices and content is evolving rapidly, tracking changes elsewhere in the internet universe. Games today can be played on any device, PCs and smartphones, not just a dedicated game console.
Gaming is now mobile. Game content is increasingly being streamed, just like Netflix and Amazon Prime. You can play games on YouTube. And an Xbox can be used as a PC to surf the Internet and do your homework.
The immediate threat to Sony posed by Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard is that Microsoft will make the content it is acquiring — global blockbusters like Call of Duty and World of Warcraft — exclusive to Xbox users and invite defections from PlayStation users who want to keep playing their favorite games.
But this is just one element of the multifaceted ecosystem effects Microsoft can deploy to squeeze Sony. Sony should be nervous, for example, that it has no cloud or streaming capability of its own and relies on Microsoft’s own Azure platform to deliver streaming content to Sony users.
Sony’s game and network services segment now accounts for 30% of its revenues. It is hard to see how Sony can compete in the long-term in a narrow game-specific segment without credibly competing with the likes of Microsoft, Alphabet/Google and Amazon across the board in all segments of the device-content spectrum.
From a financial point of view, Sony is not only behind the tech giants with ecosystems. Sony simply does not have the major financial muscle needed to pull off massive acquisitions of game publishers (massive meaning more than $5 billion per each acquisition) that each have lots of game developers, intellectual properties and technologies. The Japanese giant does have a business ecosystem but it’s too small and too narrow compared to its Western competitors. This also means Sony reaches much less customers worldwide.
In a possible response to Xbox-Activision-Blizzard deal, Sony can try to acquire its fellow Japanese gaming entities like Capcom, SEGA or Square Enix and integrate the entity(s) into PlayStation, but that will require not just a whole bunch of money but also willingness to not just make big offers the other party cannot turn down, but also the willingness to overcome all the legal obstacles, solve all the complications, absorb all the employees, fund future projects already in development, etc. If the PlayStation team is willing on building up its very own exclusive properties, they could expand the work forces as well as the projects of their very own game studios.
The Xbox-Activision-Blizzard deal is very hard to match not just because of the financial value and organizational weights involved, but also because the said deal covers consoles, Windows PC, mobile devices, cloud gaming, browser gaming and much more. The PlayStation ecosystem is still console-focused and so far team PlayStation released only a few of its games on PC. Is Sony even working to improve PlayStation Now? Are the PlayStation executives realizing that their 3rd party marketing deals won’t lift up their corporation and consumer base anymore? Has it occurred to the PlayStation executives that future games of the Crash Bandicoot and Spyro The Dragon franchises (both of which are permanently identified with Sony’s gaming brand due to exclusive games released on the first PlayStation console) will be released only on Xbox platforms?
As mentioned in the Nikkei Asia article above, business ecosystems are not perfect and they have their flaws that affect customers in bad ways. As such, the ecosystem powers and organizers should do their work to be more user-friendly and be more consumer-oriented. Still, the ecosystem approach to business has proven to be very effective with regards to reaching the widest number of consumers worldwide as well as driving business growth to new heights, not to mention generating economic benefits for business partners involved (example: credit card companies whose users buy on Amazon, Xbox network, Google, etc.) No amount of sales of Final Fantasy games and Street Fighter games exclusive to PlayStation consoles will ever match that.
As for the console fanboys who still hate Xbox, they should learn to stop living with fantasy and wake up to reality. Time to grow up.
In ending this piece, posted below are videos related to Xbox and the Activision Blizzard deal…
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