Easily one of the biggest megatons of Sony's E3 2015 press conference was the fact that the Japanese giant had somehow stolen the marketing rights for Call of Duty: Black Ops III from Microsoft, despite the fact that the franchise has been an Xbox staple for years upon years now. The marketing deal that the American company had with Activision ensured that Xbox players would have access to downloadable content earlier than the competition, but that's being reversed this time around thanks to the publisher's new agreement with Sony.
So, how did such a deal come about? In an interview with GameSpot, Sony's always enthusiastic Adam Boyes told the publication that "well, I think the first thing was we've had a great relationship with Activision around Destiny, and I'm a huge fan of that." Boyes goes on to say that as soon as he saw it, he knew that Black Ops III was something that Sony wanted a piece of, saying that "we fell in love instantly".
"And so obviously, we just continued talking with our partners at Activision and worked something out. And now we've got I think a great benefit to all the gamers," Boyes concludes. The deal marks a huge event in what's already looking like a thrilling console generation, and it's clear that Sony's relationships with third party publishers is now one of its real strengths, as evidenced by how many agreements it currently has with various other firms.
But what do you make of Sony's dealings? Are you happy to see the company cement its relations with other industry heavyweights? Rant about exclusive DLC in the comments section below.
[source gamespot.com]
Comments (32)
"A great benefit to all gamers".
Please Mr Boyes, explain in great detail how moving the earlier access to content from one platform to another benefits "all gamers".
@BLPs And me.
I get having exclusives, but timed DLC? Really?
The fact that we consider the concept of "who will pay more money for DLC first" a great thing for gamers, is baffling to me. Since I am indifferent about CoD, Activision has a massive catalog of companies and games under them, so I hope for certain franchises to come back....
@KratosMD That's probably the only thing I'd want out of that partnership. Exclusive COD stuff just makes me feel so meh, a freaking supernova could happen and I wouldn't care.
I've never had a problem with timed DLC because the content is never substantial enough to be worth moaning about, at the end of day Sony has a responsibility to provide value for their gamers, plus marketing lures people onto their platform over the competition. Everybody does it not just Sony, Nintendo have got in on the act with their exclusive amiibo for Skylanders, bet no one was giving "good old ninty" a rollicking for that though?
@adf86 Maybe if Nathan Drake or Master Chief were in CoD then there would be an argument. There is a difference between exclusive content and timed DLC.
Too bad I pick star wars over this, last year I picked cod, not battlefield but this year I ll pass this I guess
@adf86 Actually, Nintendo have had some flak regards this.
And irrespective of that, because everyone does it doesnt make it right.
We as consumers are the real problem here though.
We accept it and pay for it.
@BLPs Money. Simple.
@BLPs money talks unfortunately and the casual gamer wont pick up on this at all. Therefore they pay through the nose for it. As long as people are not educated about how it all works, then deals like this will continue to thrive.
It's all about the money, it's only about the money.
@ToOGoodOfAPlaya Your right that consumers have the power to prevent it but the one's who really care (us lot) are in the minority. Getting marketing and timed DLC on games like CoD, Battlefront and Arkham Knight probably end up shifting PS4s then the majority of 1st party exclusives.
@adf86 I agree, you are right.
Its a shame though, because it can happen, when consumers fight enough.
Who cares about rubbish timed dlc? As long as the games great at release and the dlc comes out and is okay can you not wait another 30 days? With the amount of games being released why is everyone so impatient?
I waited an age, sometimes years for ports of games in the 1980s and 90s and I know this is different, but its hardly worth getting your knickers in a twist for.
What Boyes said though "we fell in love instantly" seriously man is Boyes actually aged 11 with a penchant for red bull?
I understand exclusives made by 1st party developers, obviously, and I understand exclusives because the dev is indie and can't afford to publish on multiple consoles, and I understand exclusives that are developed for something with a gimmick like the Wii U. All other reasons for exclusive anything need to go away.
@themcnoisy -I totally agree, maybe it's our age...lol
And now we've got I think a great benefit to all the gamers,
To all PS4 games which he is right, it's also only a 30 day timed exclusive. Xbox did this for a whole generation, so nothing has really changed. If Sony didn't get it Microsoft would have, and this comment section would have zero comments.
I think paying for timed DLC, especially something like one-month early access to maps, is a pointless waste of money but if these companies believe they're benefiting, whatever. What bothers me more is if a company pays a third party to add content to their version of the game but the third party turns around and still charges the same $60 to all users eventhough an argument can be made you're not getting the full game on other platforms.
@adf86
The majority here don't care what Nintendo does. If you're a PS, Xbox guy Nintendo has done nothing to garner your attention over the brands you prefer. And if you visit NLife you will quickly learn Nintendo is perfect. Not worth getting worked up over what that company does. Especially after this past E3. NX can't get here soon enough and hopefully with a major shift in Nintendo's 'we're right you just don't get us' attitude.
I would rather have time-exclusive games, rather than DLC. I'm still mad that Rise Of The Tomb Raider is coming to XONE first, but I can still wait. Other than all of this, I'm glad Sony did this to help boost even more sales of their system, but what else do they want? Both systems have their good games, it's just that Sony has better exclusives that they continue with, unlike X-box that stops most of their exclusives after one generation (I haven't seen any new Amped, Project Gotham Racing, Banjo Kazooi, Blinx The Time Sweeper, Nightcaster, Azurik or Star Wars Knights Of The Old Republic). Anyways...live on Sony...crush the competition like you already are!!!!!!! Keep up the good work!!!!!
Maybe im the only one who remembers the years of Xbox getting these deals for CoD Fallout and so on. No one seemed to be against exclusive dlc back then. Non Xbox consoles just had to deal with it. Now we seems to be concerned about all gamers.
The only people who lose out are the folks who don't have both consoles, overwhelmingly that means it's kids that get a bum deal on this and Destiny etc, so it's not something to be applauded. It's a pointless, exclusionary tactic which the people who can play most get the worst deal.
Sony should be better than that. Anyone with a sense of ethics should be better than that.
@Gamer83 I think the timed DLC part isn't really what the companies pay for really, it's the marketing, the association with a big AAA game. So far Sony hasn't announced any exclusive DLC or such like for Star Wars Battlefront but just been closely allied with it when it comes to trailers, TV spots and paper ad's will do wonders for PS4 sales, especially off the back of the movie too.
Having seen the E3 demo I'd have been very happy for the xBone users to keep it.
@RicksReflection I had an Amstrad cpc6128 which had a floppy disk drive. Unfortunately most of the games came out on the spectrum and c64 first before being ported over to the Amstrad usually on cassette. I would wait an eternity for some games. Sometimes they wouldn't come over at all.
There were only 2 boring moments for me at SONY's E3 & that was them showing COD & Destiny, Zzzzzzzzzz
Oh & VR(sorry SONY)
Calling this a "megaton of Sony's press conference", much less "one of the biggest megatons," and much less again "Easily one of the biggest megatons," does a huge disservice to FFVII, Shenmue III, and The Last Guardian.
Putting a timed DLC deal for CoD in the same league as a veritable kitchen cupboard of the holy grails of gaming is just insulting.
Personally I think a game of this magnitude - regardless of what you think about CoD it is a big seller, doesn't need to align itself with a console. I can understand to a degree that some games may need to financial reasons but I really fail to see why CoD needs to.
Timed DLC is fairly important in this franchise as the game has a yearly cycle and a 'season' particularly with eSports etc. DLC release at fairly regular intervals too. A lot of CoD fans do tend to buy the Season Pass - at least in the past. You can see a lot of players with the extra Season Pass emblems etc and when they release a weapon early to Season Pass holders, the matches are full of people using it - certainly on xbox at least...
That being said, Timed DLC of 1 month isn't as bad as some deals (Destiny's year, or extra content in Assassins Creed 4, Watchdogs etc that never releases on other platforms) but I still think all multi-platform games should get the same content at the same time!
Ugh stop with the exclusivity crap...
It's not personal, it's business. Both Sony and Activision made the right call.
Am I the only one that thinks black ops 3 looks great?
@Fath
Not to those games at all, it just is what it is. Maybe FF VII remake will be a huge seller along the lines of CoD. Shenmue 3 and TLG? As good as both may end up, it'll be lucky if they combine for 2 mil sales.
At least it's only timed. It's way more annoying when it's permanent like DQIX and X only being on Nintendo despite being third party. Hell, even Pokemon, since contrary to what a lot of people think, it's not made by Nintendo or a company Nintendo has any amount of ownership of. Then they buy Monolith and trap games like Xenoblade on a dead console like the Wii U. Come to think of it, they're worse than MS in that regard.
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