Just last week, Take-Two surprised everyone with the announced takeover of mobile game publisher Zynga. This week, Microsoft trumped that acquisition. You can find out that and what else happened this week in this episode of the GIGA Headlines.
Microsoft plans to acquire Activision Blizzard
For $69 billion wants Microsoft Activision Blizzard, the game publisher behind Call of Duty, World of Warcraft, over watch, Candy Crush, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater and Guitar Hero take over. The deal is expected to close in fiscal 2023.
This means that Microsoft is growing again, after all, it was only last year Bethesda’s parent company, Zenimax snapped up for a comparatively cheap $8 billion.
But, why has Microsoft struck Activision at all?
Certainly one aspect was that the company was relatively cheap after as a result of the Lawsuit alleging structural sexism and sexual assault in the workplace Activision Blizzard’s share price has fallen from over 80 to just over 50 euros.
Rather, Microsoft should benefit from the mobile games studio “King” that was also purchased. So far, Microsoft has not had a particularly large presence in the mobile games market, which, however, accounts for a large part of sales in the games sector.
In addition, the acquisition of Activision Blizzard also includes a huge catalog of brands, which will then sooner or later in the Game Pass could land.
PlayStation users are currently not supposed to console exclusivity of these brands have to worry about. Well, at least for now.
As Xbox boss Phil Spencer has announced, they want to “honor all contractual agreements and keep Call of Duty on the PlayStation”.
That means that everything stays the way it is. Some games will probably come with Game Pass. However, it remains to be seen whether new titles could become Xbox exclusives in the future.
Google Play Games: Android games on Windows PCs
Google has entered the beta phase of “Google Play Games“ started. A launcher to play Android games on Windows PC. The program has not yet started in Germany, it is currently only available in South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong.
Microsoft had a similar application with which you should be able to start Android apps natively on a Windows 11 PC, and this function was already announced at the launch of Windows 11 but so far postponed.
Electronic waste: Federal Environment Minister wants repair commitments
Federal Environment Minister Steffi Lemke has hers Plans for less e-waste presented. According to their proposal, manufacturers should write on the packaging of their products how long the expected service life of the respective electrical device is. This should result in better comparability for the consumer.
At the same time, it should apply that during this printed period, the manufacturer assumes the guarantee for the device, i.e. has to repair the device accordingly.
Police NRW came up with the robot dog
The NRW police made an investment to present the new “Innovation Lab” in Duisburg and Boston Dynamics’ spot as a police dog created.
NRW Minister of the Interior Herbert Reul says “we are testing here in which areas the robot could be useful in the future”.
So we’ll probably have to get by without robotic police dogs on the streets for some time.
In February 2021, Spot was already tested by the New York police. After massive criticism, this attempt was discontinued after two months.