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At least 11 members of congress argue Sony is unfairly impeding Xbox in JP

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BennyBlanco

BennyBlanco

aka IMurRIVAL69


Members of Congress from both sides of the aisle are pressing the Biden administration to take action on PlayStation-Xbox console competition in Japan.

Driving the news: Policymakers raised concerns last week to Biden officials, saying Sony’s business practices in its native Japan are blocking U.S. companies from competing in that country’s gaming market and could be running afoul of U.S.-Japan trade deals.
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What they’re saying: “Today, we write to bring to your attention the imbalanced Japanese video game market, which we are concerned may be a result of a discriminatory trade practice that could violate the spirit of the U.S.-Japan Digital Trade Agreement,” states one of the letters, signed by four Republicans from the House, including Carol Miller (R-W.Va.) and Mike Carey (R-Ohio).
  • The Republican letter alleges that Sony PlayStation has 98% of the “high-end console market in Japan,” signs deals designed to keep hit Japanese games from Microsoft’s Xbox, and says such moves “may violate Japan’s antitrust laws.”
  • “The Japanese government’s effective policy of non-prosecution when it comes to Sony appears to be a serious barrier to U.S. exports, with real impacts for Microsoft and the many U.S. game developers and publishers that sell globally but see their earnings in Japan depressed by these practices,” the letter continues.
Click to expand...

  • While Microsoft isn’t saying just how involved it was in orchestrating this push, its government affairs team has discussed these issues with members of Congress, Axios understands.
  • “Sony’s anti-competitive tactics deserve discussion, and we welcome further investigation to ensure a level playing field in the video game industry,” Microsoft spokesperson David Cuddy told Axios.
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Moneyhatting your favorite weeb games?


dana-white.gif



This is getting petty.
 
Deft Beck

Deft Beck

Member
This is a really strange, backwards argument. Microsoft failed to make a compelling product for the Japanese audience's needs. This is well documented.

With Microsoft's current offerings, that isn't really going to change. I think something like the Steam Deck is a much more compelling product for Japanese audiences given their affinity for the Nintendo Switch.
 
thicc_girls_are_teh_best

thicc_girls_are_teh_best

Member
Fuck Satya Nadella. I knew something was being cooked up when he brought this up in that MSNBC interview.

These Congress members, like Maria Cantwell, probably have MS money connections through funding (Maria Cantwell herself getting almost $600K in funding directly from Microsoft), and are trying to legitimize an otherwise batshit insane theory that, somehow, Sony had to pay off Japanese developers to not release Japanese versions of their games for the dead XBO, the XBO that Microsoft killed over there due to treating the market like an afterthought. But somehow that is Sony's fault.

These brainlets don't even realize they are insinuating that the Japanese government are involved in collusion by pressing these claims, and I'm sure it's a great idea to piss off one of your few Asian political allies in the Pacific while China and Russia seem to be rolling ahead on great terms. But it's not the first time American politicians have messed things up with global partners, and it won't be the last.

The hilarious part is that when you actually look at 8th gen Japanese releases, virtually all of the big Japanese games came to XBO globally. FF XIV didn't, but that's because Microsoft rejected crossplay in the 360 gen. SFV didn't, but that's because Sony co-funded the game and sponsored it for CapCup. FF VII Remake didn't, but that's because the game ran into dev issues and Sony probably stepped in and wanted exclusivity in return.

Now, if there's only one way they can maybe prove Sony are in the wrong here, it's in relation to cross-gen games post-2020. Now I guess it can be considered "interesting" that we've been seeing PS4 versions for tons of games that don't have any XBO versions available, such as RE4 recently, but that could also be explained through MS officially discontinuing the XBO in 2020, phasing out both it and the One X, and revamping their XDK into the GDK which would have made devs less inclined to spread their cross-gen resources across two wildly different SDKs and APIs (considering for one of the, XDK, it'd be for officially discontinued consoles seeing a lot of upgrades to the new Xboxes anyway).

That's honestly the only leg of a hope & prayer these Congress people have in trying to prove Sony guilty in doing this, otherwise they are just looking for a scapegoat to dump Microsoft's failures with the Japanese market and Japanese developers onto, and oh hey it just happens to be the company that was most against the acquisition. What a surprise.
 
C

C2brixx

Member
Deft Beck said:
This is a really strange, backwards argument. Microsoft failed to make a compelling product for the Japanese audience's needs. This is well documented.

With Microsoft's current offerings, that isn't really going to change. I think something like the Steam Deck is a much more compelling product for Japanese audiences given their affinity for the Nintendo Switch.
Click to expand...
This isn't about what Microsoft failed to do. This is about Sony's anti-competitive practices that appears to violate trade laws.
 
BennyBlanco

BennyBlanco

aka IMurRIVAL69
Dane said:
I've been reading that Sony shenanigans may have brought investigation into their third party exclusives behaviors, is that true? This is the most lulz case ever of "play stupid games and win stupid prizes"
Click to expand...

Sony overplayed their hand badly. They have to submit a ton of documents to MS lawyers about their 3rd party deals. As you can see MS has no shortage of US politicians in their pocket. I doubt anything comes of this but they are clearly searching for ways to fuck up Sonys operation now.
 
James Sawyer Ford

James Sawyer Ford

Gold Member
thicc_girls_are_teh_best said:
Fuck Satya Nadella. I knew something was being cooked up when he brought this up in that MSNBC interview.

These Congress members, like Maria Cantwell, probably have MS money connections through funding (Maria Cantwell herself getting almost $600K in funding directly from Microsoft), and are trying to legitimize an otherwise batshit insane theory that, somehow, Sony had to pay off Japanese developers to not release Japanese versions of their games for the dead XBO, the XBO that Microsoft killed over there due to treating the market like an afterthought. But somehow that is Sony's fault.

These brainlets don't even realize they are insinuating that the Japanese government are involved in collusion by pressing these claims, and I'm sure it's a great idea to piss off one of your few Asian political allies in the Pacific while China and Russia seem to be rolling ahead on great terms. But it's not the first time American politicians have messed things up with global partners, and it won't be the last.

The hilarious part is that when you actually look at 8th gen Japanese releases, virtually all of the big Japanese games came to XBO globally. FF XIV didn't, but that's because Microsoft rejected crossplay in the 360 gen. SFV didn't, but that's because Sony co-funded the game and sponsored it for CapCup. FF VII Remake didn't, but that's because the game ran into dev issues and Sony probably stepped in and wanted exclusivity in return.

Now, if there's only one way they can maybe prove Sony are in the wrong here, it's in relation to cross-gen games post-2020. Now I guess it can be considered "interesting" that we've been seeing PS4 versions for tons of games that don't have any XBO versions available, such as RE4 recently, but that could also be explained through MS officially discontinuing the XBO in 2020, phasing out both it and the One X, and revamping their XDK into the GDK which would have made devs less inclined to spread their cross-gen resources across two wildly different SDKs and APIs (considering for one of the, XDK, it'd be for officially discontinued consoles seeing a lot of upgrades to the new Xboxes anyway).

That's honestly the only leg of a hope & prayer these Congress people have in trying to prove Sony guilty in doing this, otherwise they are just looking for a scapegoat to dump Microsoft's failures with the Japanese market and Japanese developers onto, and oh hey it just happens to be the company that was most against the acquisition. What a surprise.
Click to expand...

Yup.

This is the same old song and dance political lobbying effort (funded and spearheaded by MS) and used to undermine ongoing FTC work into the Activision acquisition.
 
TheGodfather07

TheGodfather07

Member
Microsoft putting their trillions to work right now. I guess people forgot xbox 360 and all those Japanese exclusives? Guess what happened? It still sold fuck all and they all went running back to sony. The Japanese are happy with Sony and Nintendo systems. They simply ain't interested in xbox. It has nothing to do with Sony. It's not even microsofts fault either.
 
Last edited:
slade

slade

Member
  • “The Japanese government’s effective policy of non-prosecution when it comes to Sony appears to be a serious barrier to U.S. exports, with real impacts for Microsoft and the many U.S. game developers and publishers that sell globally but see their earnings in Japan depressed by these practices,” the letter continues.
This part is pretty stupid. It hss been known for a long time now that Western videogames don't sell a lot in Japan. How is that Sony's fault?

As for Sony actually keeping publisher's off Xbox, I can see that increasing in the coming years. It may become East vs. West on consoles.
 
In Cold Blood

In Cold Blood

Banned
Me thinks that MS is intending to buy a big Japanese publisher.
There was talk that the Japanese government had laws stopping outside companies buying Japanese ones.
Apparently there is some free trade talks going on.with Japan and this is being brought up as an issue.
If so, the elected US officials are pushing the agenda of American companies, which is exactly what they meant to do, and what every other country does as well.
Having meltdowns about MS.paying off politicians is just ridiculous.
 
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