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Microsoft says a Sony bargain with Activision stops Telephone call of Duty coming to Game Pass

(Image credit: Activision)

A footnote in Microsoft'southward submission (opens in new tab) to the UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has let slip the reason behind Phone call of Duty's absenteeism from the Xbox Game Pass library: Sony and Activision Blizzard accept a deal that restricts the games' presence on the service.

The footnote appears in a department detailing the potential benefits to consumers (from Microsoft's point of view) of the Activision Blizzard catalogue coming to Game Pass. In it, Microsoft says that it plans to honour "existing contractual obligations that Activision Blizzard may have with other platforms" in the outcome of its $68 billion acquisition (opens in new tab) going forward.

What existing contractual obligations are those? Why, ones like the "agreement between Activision Blizzard and Sony," that places "restrictions on the ability of Activision Blizzard to identify COD titles on Game Pass for a number of years". Information technology was apparently these kinds of agreements that Xbox's Phil Spencer had in mind (opens in new tab) when he spoke to Sony bosses in January and confirmed Microsoft's "intent to honor all existing agreements upon conquering of Activision Blizzard".

Unfortunately, the footnote ends there, and so there's not much in the way of detail well-nigh what these restrictions are or how long they'd remain in outcome in a potential post-acquisition world. Given COD'southward continued non-appearance on Game Pass, yous've got to imagine the restrictions are fairly significant if they're non an outright block on COD coming to the service. Either way, the simple fact that Microsoft is apparently willing to maintain any restrictions on its ain ability to put beginning-political party games on Game Pass is rather remarkable, given that making Game Laissez passer more appealing is one of the reasons for its acquisition spree.

The irony of Sony making deals like this one while fretting most COD's future on PlayStation probably isn't lost on Microsoft's lawyers, which is no uncertainty function of why they brought information technology upwards to the CMA. While it's absolutely reasonable to worry about a world in which more and more properties are concentrated in the hands of atypical, giant megacorps, it does await a fleck odd if you're complaining almost losing access to games while stopping them from joining competing services.

We'll observe out if the CMA agrees when information technology completes its in-depth, "Phase 2" investigation (opens in new tab) into the Activision Blizzard acquisition, which is some way off yet. For now, nosotros'll have to content ourselves with poring over these kinds of corporate submissions for more interesting tidbits like this one. And so far, we've already learned that Microsoft privately has a gloomy forecast for the future of cloud gaming (opens in new tab), and that the visitor thinks Sony shouldn't worry and then much since, hey, hereafter COD games might be equally underwhelming as Vanguard (opens in new tab). Who knows what nosotros'll learn next?

One of Josh's outset memories is of playing Quake 2 on the family computer when he was far too young to be doing that, and he's been irreparably game-brained always since. Since then, his writing has been featured in Vice, Fanbyte, and the Fiscal Times. He'll play pretty much annihilation, and has written far too much on everything from visual novels to Assassin's Creed. His virtually profound loves are for CRPGs, immersive sims, and any game whose ambition outstrips its budget. He thinks y'all're all far too mean virtually Deus Ex: Invisible War.