PlayStation icons Crash Bandicoot and Spyro the Dragon could soon move on from Sony’s consoles, if Microsoft’s latest deal with the rival company is anything to go by.
A lot has been happening surrounding Microsoft and Activision over the last few weeks. To summarise, Microsoft battled it out in court with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to argue that its proposed acquisition of Activision was fair, and won. This means that the company now has to deal with the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), who decided to block the deal back in April. With that in mind, it’s still not 100% confirmed that the buyout is definitely going ahead, but Microsoft’s win against the FTC has moved everything one step further ahead.
If Microsoft successfully buys Activision, it’ll own the Call of Duty IP. Take a look at some of the funniest Warzone wins and fails below.
Understandably, Sony has been very opposed to the deal going through, mainly because of its concern over potentially losing Call of Duty. As The Verge reports, it’s now been confirmed that Sony has agreed to a deal with Microsoft which will keep Call of Duty on PlayStation for 10 years. However, what’s interesting is that this deal only applies to CoD, meaning that other Activision franchises such as Spyro and Crash aren’t necessarily safe.
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For reference, the deal offered to Sony by Microsoft in January 2022 promised to keep “all existing Activision console titles on Sony, including future versions in the Call of Duty franchise or any other current Activision franchise on Sony through 31 December, 2027”. Despite this, the head of global communications at Xbox, Kari Perez, confirmed with The Verge that the 10-year deal is only for Call of Duty.
Obviously, this doesn’t mean that every other Activision franchise is going to disappear from PlayStation imminently, but if the deal is fully finalised, there’d technically be nothing stopping Xbox from nabbing a few extra exclusives later down the line. While Crash Bandicoot and Spyro the Dragon haven’t been exclusive to PlayStation for quite some time, they’re still widely considered to be classic PlayStation icons, so it’d be particularly strange to see them become Xbox exclusives. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens.
Featured Image Credit: ActivisionTopics: Crash Bandicoot, PlayStation, Sony, Xbox, Microsoft, Activision