Are they on Microsoft’s shopping list?

The Sims, The biggest publisher shake-up of all time could be on the cards, if Microsoft ends up buying the company behind FIFA and Battlefield.

More PS5 pre-orders promised over ‘next few days’ as Sony apologies

Electronic Arts are the biggest third party video game publisher in the world, with over 8,000 employees and revenues of almost $5 billion, but there’s always a bigger fish. And if rumours are true Microsoft could be looking to make EA their next purchase.

The rumours were started by website Polygon, and framed by Microsoft’s puzzling lack of exclusive games for the Xbox One – which many have blamed for the fact that, worldwide, it is currently being outsold 2:1 by the PlayStation 4.

This has been a problem for years now, and yet Microsoft has done very little to either set up new studios or sign-up exclusive deals. In fact, that they’ve tended to do the opposite: closing down Fable makers Lionhead Studios and cancelling PlatinumGames’ Scalebound.

Considering how long it takes to form a new studio or make a new game their only real option, unless they just don’t care about exclusives, is to buy something that already exists. But until now no one ever imagined that would include a company as big as EA.

The two American companies have always worked very closely together though. So closely in fact that many suspect EA actively encouraged the always-online features the Xbox One so disastrously revealed at its launch in 2013.

Polygon names its source only as someone that is ‘close to Microsoft’ but Xbox boss Phil Spencer has recently been hinting at acquiring companies.

EA would cost around $35 billion to acquire, but since Microsoft has a war chest of around $130 billion (recently boosted by Donald Trump’s bizarre tax cuts for the rich) the idea isn’t as crazy as it sounds. Especially as EA are already a very healthy, and highly profitable, company.

Other companies suggested as possible acquisition targets, but apparently with not such reliable sources, are Steam owners Valve and PUBG Corp., makers of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. Neither of which are exactly modest purchases either.

There’s currently zero evidence for any of this, but Microsoft’s predicament and the ways out of it are clear for everyone to see.

Whether they really will buy EA only time will tell, but if they do it means that games including FIFA, Madden NFL, Battlefield, Need For Speed, Dragon Age, Mass Effect, and The Sims will all become Xbox (and by extension PC) exclusives.

Microsoft would also gain exclusive access to the Star Wars video game licence, including Battlefront and whatever other games EA currently has in development.

Update: It’s been pointed out that the FIFA licence requires (or at least used to require) the game to be released on every major format, which may mean Microsoft has to publish the game on PlayStation 4 anyway. That’s not as unlikely as it sounds though, as they already choose to do that with the Minecraft franchise.

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