Tencent Buys Back 4 Blood Developer Turtle Rock Studios

Screw Tencent. That is all.

They better not say anything bad about China, CCP to be more exact.

Good thing the beta sucked! That’ll be the last thing I ever played from that studio.

There goes my hope for some Winnie the Pooh DLC for Back 4 Blood.

Also, **** Tencent.

taiwan is a country

@Royalblues Microsoft without a doubt. At least Microsoft don’t pay taxes to the bloodthirsty death machine they’re situated in 😛

Was really pumped for Back 4 Blood. Bought the game at launch and found it to be a soulless imitation of Left 4 Dead. This acquisition won’t help

@Royalblues oh Microsoft any day. These Chinese mega corporations are an extension of the CCP, the biggest human rights violators on the planet currently.

I tried the beta and again post-release on my BiL's Xbox One X and as a huge fan of L4D, I just cannot get over how "off" B4B feels. It's weird because it's just that little bit off of feeling quick and snappy and good to play. And I could not get past that.

@Royalblues Agreed, personally I feel that no one should be selling anything to an enemy power. If Tencent was HK or Taiwan based, it would be a different story, but I find it truly unsettling that they are swooping up so many western interests.

I dont actually mind back 4 blood ive quite enjoyed it

@Royalblues if you was a sony fan you would have to pick tencent, as if Microsoft buys a developer it's games become xbox exclusive, but if tencent buys a developer its games will still be on playstation

Then these worthless scumbags won't get a penny from me

This is a good time to remind everyone if you’re looking for a game similar to L4D, try WWZ Aftermath instead.

@ScottyG "the CCP, the biggest human rights violators on the planet currently."

I dunno is a toss up between them Saudi Arabia and Israel but regardless these Tecent guys seem to want a stake in everything, I'm sure if they could have a stake in Sony and Microsoft they would.

No more bing chilling from me

@Killionaire @jaunalf

Sorry guys I should’ve elaborated, I was talking “biggest” as in the scale that they commit these violations on, not just what they’re doing.

@Royalblues I’d rather have one of the big 3 (Nintendo, Sony, MS) buy anyone over the likes of Tencent, Amazon or Google.

Much rather have them bought by Tencent than MS even if China is garbage. I'm sick of MS using money from outside of the industry to try and brute force control of it. At least Amazon and Google aren't buying up massive 3rd party publishers just to take IP's off other platforms.

@mucc they literally all do the same 🤣 you think Tencent and Sony money comes just from the gaming sector.

@Fenbops Most of what Sony makes does come from their gaming division actually since it's so profitable. Obviously the start had to be funded elsewhere.

@Royalblues
What’s important? Politics, console warring or be able to play a game if you like it (i.e. gaming)?

@JJ2 I think the people in concentration camps would probably pick option A there.

@nessisonett
Of course. It’s no rocket science. Sometimes there’s more important. However you easily get caught in making everything be about politics. Gaming is great in bringing every gamers together in the world. I know perspective can be very different and you could go to fight other guys over many issues.
I’m here to talk about gaming though. Ta

@JJ2 This is about gaming though. A game developer is tying itself to a company directly funding concentration camps. I’m sure they’d love to play games.

@nessisonett
If you can boycott all those nasty companies around the world. Good for you man 👍

@Royalblues How about neither. I’d rather they stay independent and get funded by third-party publishers for their own projects. But, that’s not reality.

Personally, I could give a crap less what Tencent chooses to buy. The US has people dying from crime and gun violence everyday and nobody gives a sh*t enough to change anything, but I’m suppose to care about what China is doing? Yeah. Don’t care.

@UltimateOtaku91 If you was a Sony fan. You wouldn't care. Cause even if it became an "Xbox Exclusive" you could still easily play it on PC, or on TVs, Android device, iOS devices, MacOS devices, Linux devices through xCloud.

Only fanboys have the kind of mindset that can excuse Tencent buying a company as along as game are released on Playstation.

@Royalblues I've another question...what's the greater of two evils... Acquisitions of studios...or patents locking away gameplay mechanics? ... I know which I'd prefer.

A lot of outspoken people about to go missing if China buy PushSquare 👀

Considering China has specifically said the goal of acquiring international media is to "educate" and "improve the way people think about China." I.E. A propaganda engine, it should be immensely concerning when China buys any media entity. MS and Sony just want all your money. China wants your brain.

@mucc That's an awkward line to draw. That's precisely how Sony wrestled their way into Sega and Nintendo's industry, by using their money from other industries to outspend and force their way into the market, including buying up and securing exclusivity from many game developers. MS doing the same somehow becomes bad, because the big fish is challenged by an even bigger fish? Tencent is also using their money from outside the industry (Remember they're a government contractor for the social credit system...big fat public money checks.) If "using money from outside the gaming industry" to gain power and influence in the industry is a negative, I think you'd want to avoid Sony, too, and go Nintendo + Steam-only. Those are companies almost entirely build around their game business.

It's not like Sony was holding up their gaming division using PlayStation revenues during the PS3 + Vita era...

Currently, in addition to the highly profitable gaming business, Sony has a profitable movie business, a duopoly on music rights, publishing & recording (Look on the back of any CD, you'll likely see "BMG" as the rights holder...that's Sony) a format holder that receives royalties on every BD disc sold (including those pesky Xbox discs), electronics of course, battery tech (smartphones!), optical, and their actual biggest industries by revenue remain their insurance and financial services sectors.

MS is throwing big money around to reinforce their gaming division, yes, though they're not exactly "new" to gaming, they've been doing Xbox for 20 years and Windows games for as long as PlayStation has existed. It's not like Apple or Amazon storming their way in totally from another industry and taking over, MS just kind of worked parallel to consoles with different types of games not on consoles, before getting into consoles for the primary reason that gaming was very important to their Windows business and their hardware partners (Intel) business, and the success of PlayStation was starting to move developers away from their proprietary development tools and Windows dependency. Xbox was created, not to ENTER the gaming business, but actually to protect their exiting gaming business from the "newcomer", PlayStation, that was starting to threaten it. The longest-term Sony gamers started playing PS in 1995. The longest-term Microsoft gamers were playing things like Hover! and AoE within that time period. Not to mention Minesweeper, technically an early XGS title that's probably more popular than Fortnite if you add all the office hours lost to it in the 90s!

Really, Atari, Nintendo, Sega represent the oldest of what we consider gaming (excluding Apple II, ZX Spectrum, Calicovision etc), Sony and MS and MS both represent the second wave. Tencent, Apple, Google, Facebook, Amazon represent an ugly new wave applying some ugly business tactics worse than the already ugly business tactics from the old group.

Tencent screws up everything they touch. Their cousin Fifty doesn’t even talk to them anymore!

I long for the days when games mattered more than the politics and the negative views,ulterior motives etc,etc...back 4 blood is a great game even with its few flaws and quirks and just because tencent bought the company dosnt mean i'm going to stop playing it..

I hate that the industry is getting more narrow. I miss when there were more independent studios. I suppose it was inevitable with the cost of development skyrocketing...

@Royalblues the company that releases their games on the console I own.

They only own the ips, not the important part, the people making them. If they continue to make the ip a success (which seems to be quite difficult judging by historical buyouts), then good for them i guess. If they don't, then fine, I'll play something else.
Microsoft for example, if the bethesda buyout actually results in a good new fallout game one day, maybe i will pay attention, not very optimistic right now though.

@NEStalgia I'm not going to reply to your entire incorrect, obnoxiously long wall of text but if you think what MS is doing now is anywhere close to what Sony did to get in the industry then you're delusional. First of all Sony tried to create a console with Nintendo, it wasn't until Nintendo screwed them and they decided to make Playstation on their own. Sure the money to start up that division came elsewhere, that isn't my problem which I've already stated. You realize Nintendo didn't start with their video game division either right? They've been a company for over 100 years, so no it's not a company built entirely on its video game business.

Please list these exclusive deals Sony did at the start of Playstation that come anywhere close to buying up an entire major publisher (something that's never been done before) just to force you into their ecosystem? Playstation was hugely popular with developers because N64 still used expensive outdated cartridges and the Saturn was a weak system for 3D gaming which was the trend, not because they were throwing tons of money at people for exclusives. Even the developers they bought were ones that they already worked with and owned the IP's for like Naughty Dog so they weren't essentially trying to strengthen their hold on anything other than keeping their series THEY created going.

Microsoft themselves had barely anything to do with gaming before the Xbox. They didn't even have a dedicated gaming division until 2000 and only had a handful of developers and series going before then. Windows was obviously very popular for gaming, but you don't need to license with MS to put a game on it so they had little involvement other than what they published. Age of Empires came out in '97 and PS1 came out in Dec '94 so not sure how that means anything. Also Minesweeper was distributed on other OS's than Windows and MS themselves had nothing to do with it. I'm stopping here because this is already too long and I've proven my point.

@mucc directx had a big impact on gaming back then, microsoft were involved, even if on a background level.

@mucc I'm much aware of the history of Nintendo and the Nintendo Play Station. As well as Sony producing the famous SPU sound synthesis chip for the SNES.

And, yes, Microsoft had a gaming division long before 2000. It was a games group under the Windows division (coincidentally Xbox remained under the windows division until around the reveal of the 1S). They were the publisher or developer for numerous series, AoE, Starlancer, Flight Sim, Links, later on, Mech Warrior. They also had a gaming accessories line under the Sidewinder name, including the original Force Feedback flight sticks (if you like dual sense haptics on your triggers, you'd have loved it when Microsoft was making much better, full featured haptic analog sticks back when ps1 was current gen. FF Racing wheels as well. ) Additionally they were involved in the Dreamcast with windows CE.

Gaming development tools were a key part of the windows strategy starting with windows 95. Most games were built on directx, and therefore vendor locked to windows, which way the time drove significant pc sales, therefore significant windows licenses. The rise of playstations popularity and the pending ps2 threatened that. Developers were shifting heavily to opengl for playstation, and weakening the dx/windows chokehold on games. Thus the Xbox. It was more about cementing directx as the standard graphics api among devs. It was literally called "Project DirectX Box", it was supposed to be renamed but the name stuck, so they just shortened it.

Other than restating the obvious that Microsoft and PlayStation have both been heavily involved in electronic entertainment since the mid 90s, and earlier to different degrees, I'm not sure what point exactly you've proved. Bottom line is if you're fond of the traditional gaming status quo, Microsoft and Sony have both been in it roughly as long, just coming from different aspects of it at different times, and not as long as Nintendo and Sega.

I know there's sour grapes over Bethesda among single console fans, but bottom line is knowing what we now know, they'd have been up for sale either way, or would have rapidly degenerated into a GaaS mtx shadow of their former selves. They had already started. Sony and Nintendo couldn't afford them (and if they could, also would have locked them exclusively), MS could, and if it weren't MS it would have been some nasty THQ style splintering, or some ugly holding company, Google, Tencent, etc. And those certainly aren't traditional companies rooted in gaming either.

If you're against industry consolidation, we absolutely agree on that. But if it's going to consolidate, I, too, would prefer things stay with the traditional gaming companies. Which absolutely includes MS

I thought Turtle Rock was fully independent and that that was the reason they were trying to bank on the l4d hype but apparently they've got a parent company huh, unless it's a shell company I guess I get it. Shame it's gotta be Tencent though, let's see if they're gonna invest into koch as well. Only seems logical at this point.
@mucc are you seriously trying to debate gaming history with NEStalgia lol? I mean you can have your opinion but you're just factually wrong on many things that he has luckily pointed out. So yeah maybe read up a bit more on gaming history, or don't as it's apparently not proving worthwhile.

@Royalblues MS without a doubt, Tencent is pure evil.

@Royalblues Microsoft obviously. More benevolent and most probably won't sell personal data unlike someone

@Royalblues You're already funding ww3.

Acquisitions are by far the lesser evil. If Xbox has shown us anything over the generations is that you can buy the IP but you can't keep the talent. So yeah, in the short term it sucks when you suddenly can't play a franchise that you could once before...but new games are made all the time, most building on what came before it.
The trend of patents for gameplay or features though...well none of us really win there. Think about all the cool games we could have got last gen using the 'nemisis system'. Think about all the pains of loading screens in 90s that could have been made easier if we were able to play arcade games during them.

Acquisitions don't limit developers...they often secure more funding for more creative visions. And at the end of the day the talent doesn't have to stay and we don't have to buy.
Patents though...I reckon we're gonna see more of those this coming gen and it's going to leave a harder impact on gaming that studios being bought.
Do you know Sony just got 'stranding' gameplay elements patented? That Nintendo is trying to get a playable characters ability to morph through objects patented as demonstrated in the new Zelda?

Tencent just vote with your wallet.

@Cherip-the-Ripper Go ahead and list what I said that is factually incorrect. I corrected him on more things he made up that were 100% incorrect like Sony "wrestling" it's way into the industry buying up and securing exclusivity with the original PS and that Nintendo was somehow more of a video game company since it was built around its video game business when it was a company for nearly a century before it got into video games.

Screw China. Screw the CCP. Screw Tencent. Screw PushSquare for censoring opinions.

#JusticeForUgyhurs

Turtle Dead-as-a-Rock Studios now I guess

back 4 blood is dogshit . nobody wanted whatever the hell that game is 👎

@Royalblues Indeed, Sony's consolidation of anime is very closely following what they did to music. Especially the Japanese industry where, essentially, all music is under the Sony Music label and virtually all artists are signed to them. Avex for live, Sony for recording with few exceptions. Even Nintendo's game OSTs, released only in Japan, usually, are always under the Sony Music label, with Sony holding exclusive distribution rights.

Worldwide of course nearly all music, or at least mainstream music is a triopoly of Sony Music, Warner Music and Universal Music. And of the three, only Warner is it's own public company (split from the larger Warner entity a few years back). Sony Music is if course Sony, and Universal is Comcast.

Not to mention anyone who remembers the digital music and film wars in the 90s and early 00s in the US remembers The antics of the MPAA, and RIAA, both industry/lobby groups mostly acting as fronts for Sony at the time, their role in the total and continuous cluster f HDCP is, the problems with HDMI as DRM first, foisting the DMCA onto our law books, the persecutions over DeCSS, and the infamous CD DRM scheme that actually broke hardware by design..... Yeah, it's pretty hard to think of them as benevolent when it comes to their aggressive business activities...

@Royalblues
Hi man happy Monday 😅
First of all we all agree it’s bad news but thinking about your strange question though what about Sony buying them instead of Ms or ten cent?

What I’m saying, and honestly in really a non antagonistic intent, is ask yourself WHY (no no, not if and but and how, really WHY) you asked that ‘would you rather’ question here but you DIDNT ask that same purely hypothetical question to Xbox users on PureXbox but with Sony buying them? Just a question for yourself to find out and be honest with the man in the mirror.

I think I know the answer but it’s also possible you genuinely don’t and need to find for yourself.

The point is most people who play only on Xbox OR only on PlayStation are just normal intelligent consumers who dont waste their money with multiple ecosystems but they like certain franchises or a type of gaming experience and playing on a certain platform you know. Both perspectives are very respectable.

Every developer recites pretty much the same spiel, like war prisoners held at gunpoint who must say they're being treated humanely.

@Royalblues
Hi
Like I said there was no animosity in my question and, for that matter, why would I not ask you a question in return of your own weird question?

As I said it’s more for yourself to see because if you don’t want to self reflect it isn’t my intent to argue to no avail. I’m not interested in argument and unfortunately too common online bickering.

I don’t believe a ‘fan base’ is predictable and for that matter I dont believe you can label a platform users visiting a dedicated site as a ‘fan base’. It’s oversimplifying (you do seem to simplify with ‘you guys’🤔)
You didn’t really answer and most of all as to WHY but that’s only to yourself that it maybe interesting.

Fact is your are questioning what you call ‘Sony fans’ (which I find weird way to put it but ok) and you imply what you think the right answer should be in a speculative IF you were a ‘Sony only fan’.
AND you aren’t questioning readers from PureXbox.

I ll just leave it at that and please don’t see malice either but a reflection you may or may not want to have.

@Royalblues
Ha Sorry if you feel offended. That wasn’t my intent and I told you so.
Just know I also feel offended if you call me and everyone here a ‘Sony Fan’ for the record. (‘Sony Only Fan’ ? 🙄) This is no ‘fan site’ and anyone can visit and comment. As a matter of fact you do so too.
Take care