VolticArchangel
Member
Oh this dude.
Now, about that free online multiplayer without the GOLD paywall on Xbox...
Now, about that free online multiplayer without the GOLD paywall on Xbox...
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Jeff Grub: Sony acquiring Square Enix was the big rumor about the next potential Sony acquisition
- Thread starter Craig of War
- Start date
- Drama Clickbait Cringe
OmegaSupreme
advanced basic bitch
That would be huge. I'm surprised they haven't done this yet. At least roll gold into gamepass.
schaft0620
Member
I thought for sure it was Ubisoft.
Borowski_1
Member
TheGodfather07
Member
It would be a first for sony to do this. Which is just bad news going forward for everybody because they will do it again in the future. If they buy square enix, they will also buy capcom in the future.
MasterCornholio
Member
I understand that insiders can get some things wrong but the ones that toy with us don't deserve our attention. It's unfortunate because some of those individuals really do have connections in the industry. It makes it extremely difficult to trust them when they do this to us.
SSfox
Member
Why would it be bad news? So you mean Sony should just sit and wait until all the others big industry ogres will eat everything?
Katajx
Member
It was in flux iirc. Nintendo of course didn’t pan out perfectly. He adjusted things if they changed and it seemed to be more of a compiled list of public information.
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rofif
Can’t Git Gud
Lance is always right.
These insiders can fuck right off with their bs.
Leaks of teasers of rumors of a trailer my ass
thicc_girls_are_teh_best
Member
So he's heard about this, yet said NOTHING about Embracer Group buying CD, Eidos Montreal, the third western SE studio or those IP? Not even so much as hint that it was happening?
Can people stop buying into anything this dude says? He's doing nothing more than speculating; we ALL speculate. Hell the speculation over here has been better and that's not up for debate.
Can people stop buying into anything this dude says? He's doing nothing more than speculating; we ALL speculate. Hell the speculation over here has been better and that's not up for debate.
Represent.
Represent(ative) of bad opinions
Please dont waste money on Square Enix.
A bunch of terrible JRPG's and bad looking games like Forespoken. Save your money.
A bunch of terrible JRPG's and bad looking games like Forespoken. Save your money.
Katajx
Member
I think it’s an appropriate take to have. I feel like we are missing the pre-E3 hype this year and biting on every little rumor.
For instance, I don’t take Imran Khan’s word as gospel or anything from Kinda Funny too.
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BennyBlanco
aka IMurRIVAL69
Remember when all the insiders leaked Bungie going to Sony and Activision/Bethesda going to MS? These deals are on a need to know basis so unless you think high level corporate execs are talking to Grubb and Speshal Ed on discord to the benefit of nobody at all this all tales from my ass.
LiquidMetal14
hide your water-based mammals
I know the 3rd shift janitors 2nd cousin proctologist and the rumour may have weight.
Kokoloko85
Member
They are dumb. There gonna lose all the 3rd party ips they have helped popularise to other publishers
Nintendo would have a heart attack if they had to pay to develope games like final fantasy and kingdom hearts lol
Gambit2483
Member
Why would SquareEnix sell themselves to Sony when so much of their console profit is coming from Nintendo? Especially in Japan?
thicc_girls_are_teh_best
Member
They have a bit more than just that. Brave Fencer Mushashi, Einhander, Parasite Eve, Ergheiz, Chrono Trigger, Live a Live, Romancing SaGa, etc. They may not be as big-name as KH, FF & DQ but they have their fans and quality history.
Square-Enix are predominantly known for their Japanese IPs, though.
Might be a sound strategy from Sony's POV but it really wouldn't mean too much to myself unless it ensured some quality revivals. Einhander should've gotten a sequel decades ago, Brave Fencer Mushashi could've been their answer to Goemon and longer-running, Parasite Eve would benefit from a really good remake, etc.
But otherwise there isn't much to say here because these rumors of Sony buying Square are only kicking up again because Grubb wants attention, nothing more. Like for real, how would they know about this yet not know anything about what just happened yesterday?
Grubb doesn't know anything about acquisitions.
Unless the sale of the western branch to Embracer leads to a significantly lower market value so it becomes much cheaper to get them, I don't know if Sony is happy that big IPs like TR are not included in the package anymore.
It doesn't seem to be the kind of streamlining they would like to see.
So let's see what happens, certainly there will be more acquisitions from Sony this year.
Unless the sale of the western branch to Embracer leads to a significantly lower market value so it becomes much cheaper to get them, I don't know if Sony is happy that big IPs like TR are not included in the package anymore.
It doesn't seem to be the kind of streamlining they would like to see.
So let's see what happens, certainly there will be more acquisitions from Sony this year.
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Ass of Can Whooping
Gold Member
Because that's irrelevant to shareholders, even if it was true
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Boss Mog
Member
Dev costs on Switch would be a lot cheaper than PS5.
pleaseinsertdisctwo
Member
Sure. Then people will finally see that the game is garbage
DeepEnigma
Gold Member
Nobody outside of them do, less they be investigated for insider trading.
These retards on social media need to be treated as such. All guessing games and tales from the urine soaked asses.
Varteras
Gold Member
There is also the very real possibility that Sony found those studios redundant to their current strategy. Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal would just be more of the same for the kinds of games Sony is already very well known for. Also, their profit margins being as low as they are probably didn't help. Tomb Raider was really the only IP with any significant value and the commercial success of that franchise has seen a stark decline since the reboot's success. It also heavily overlaps with Uncharted thematically. No need to go out and spend hundreds of millions to get Lara Croft when you already have Nathan Drake and Chloe Frazer. Best to hold onto that cash and go for something more useful. Like Ark System Works for your fighting game ambitions, since you don't have any of your own, or securing Deviation Games for your even bigger live-service push.
Baki
Member
They have a bit more than just that. Brave Fencer Mushashi, Einhander, Parasite Eve, Ergheiz, Chrono Trigger, Live a Live, Romancing SaGa, etc. They may not be as big-name as KH, FF & DQ but they have their fans and quality history.
Square-Enix are predominantly known for their Japanese IPs, though.
Might be a sound strategy from Sony's POV but it really wouldn't mean too much to myself unless it ensured some quality revivals. Einhander should've gotten a sequel decades ago, Brave Fencer Mushashi could've been their answer to Goemon and longer-running, Parasite Eve would benefit from a really good remake, etc.
But otherwise there isn't much to say here because these rumors of Sony buying Square are only kicking up again because Grubb wants attention, nothing more. Like for real, how would they know about this yet not know anything about what just happened yesterday?
Looking at their wider finances, it looks like the wester studios represented about 6% of their 2021 revenue. So perhaps not a huge change in price. That said, that revenue number doesn't properly capture the value of the IPs that Square just let go.
Regardless, after looking at Square's finances, a deal that is at a 20% premium to today's price would still be a steal from a financial perspective. It would have Square being purchased at a 12 P/E ratio and a 2 P/S ratio. It would be a pretty cheap way to increase revenue at PlayStation. Here is how that would look:
For a purchase price of $6B, Sony would add $3B revenue and $480M profit to their PlayStation division. That would represent a 12% increase in overall PlayStation revenue and a 15% increase in profits. Not a bad deal from a pure finance perspective at all.
Here's how that compares to Microsoft purchase of Activision Blizzard.
Purchase Price: $68.7B
P/E ratio: 25.4 ($2.7B profit in 2021)
P/S ratio: 7.8 ($8.8B revenue in 2021)
We're talking about a 200% difference in P/E ratios and 390% difference in P/S ratio. Not bad at all. Ofcourse, Activision has a particularly high P/E and P/S ratio due to market dominance, potential for growth, and current growth rates.
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yurinka
Member
Musashi was great but I think it was maybe a bit too niche/too Japanese focused for modern days. Now big publishers prefer games with a more global appeal so would skip games like Goemon. Musashi maybe was in the limit, with them not sure if popular enough to revive it.
I see more potential for Parasite Eve, even if the original ones weren't supersellers I think that a reboot could work: AAA ARPG with somewhat realistic Japanese like visuals, a hot and elegant blonde female as main protagonist, a bit of horror... I see it, and also think that is a project that I can see being made by different Sony or Square teams.
I think that if Sony wants some small shooter for PS+ or VR they could hire someone to make it or to give it to Housemarque.
Think that being acquired by Sony would mean extra money to grow and work in more games. Plus also many more 1st or 2nd party non-Square studios who could work in them. And also pretty likely a bigger effort to put old games on PS+ or PSN, meaning that maybe one of them has sparks player interest there for some reason, which could help convince them to revive some IP.
Yes, I highly doubt he heard anything at all. He's only guessing stuff like the rest of us and it isn't hard to reach the conclussion that Sony could be interested on Square because it's an excellent fit:But otherwise there isn't much to say here because these rumors of Sony buying Square are only kicking up again because Grubb wants attention, nothing more. Like for real, how would they know about this yet not know anything about what just happened yesterday?
- It's public, from multiple official sources, that Sony plans to make more acquisitions and even is hiring people to work on this so there are multiple or big acquisitions coming
- They have a lot of money and almost no debt, can afford big acquisitions. Sony could afford to buy SE
- MS did big publisher acquisitions so SIE could react doing the same
- Sony in a corporate level (not only gaming) has as one of their current goals to acquire content for their store and services
- SIE likes to acquire companies who worked on many PS exclusives, SE has a ton of them
- SIE likes to acquire companies who would help them cover genres/game types not covered by their 1st party (in this case RPG)
- SIE wants to grow in PC, other consoles (in this case seems that wihtout using PS Studios for this) and specially mobile
- SIE would welcome old classics from past generations to fill PS+ and to have more new top AAA in their portfolio to fill roadmaps
- SIE wants to bring PS IPs with potential to be used in movies, tv shows or anime, so better if owned by them
- SIE wants to grow in Asia, a huge Japanese publisher would help
- SIE wants to grow in GaaS, FFXIV is the best performing MMORPG as of now
- SIE wants to grow in mobile and bring their IPs to mobile, SE has been very successful at this
- With Bungie they started a way to place there publishers who can be under SIE but continue being full multiplatform to secure them for their console and service, and pretty likely get secondary exclusives from them (game subs, demos/betas, bundles) and block any exclusive for the competition
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Badlucktroll
Member
Yeah right….
009EspadaSageJay
Member
No one should be mad the internet said E3 is irrelevant we dont need E3 lets just tune in to leakers, insiders and empty podcast were people who roll a dice to make topics so that they get them those sweat patreon bucks from news starved gamers. Sony buying Square wasnt going to happen Square has 0 interest in selling to Sony, Capcom has 0 interest in selling to Sony, Capcom and Square are making boat loades of money going multiple platform Literally the last Nintendo Direct has more Square games then the last 4 years of Sony conferences combined and thats before we talk about all of the arcade,phone, and console only games that never leave japan in the 1st place. Sony is making Money had over fist with Fortnight DLC and GTA online those are the only ads on the ps5 dashboard outside of whatever flavor of the month BR game is there.
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DeepEnigma
Gold Member
Facts.
Kokoloko85
Member
That would be so bad lol
remember_spinal
Banned
You can say that about a lot of these acquisitions. Why would bethesda sell itself to microsoft when a large chunk of its sales came from playstation?
The fact is, bethesda was struggling to stay a float and needed a security net. The same thing could be happening to square enix and a lot of other 3rd party publishers. What square enix makes from AA nintendo games isn’t a significant amount of money to reject a buy-out offer either.
For example what big games have square enix sold on nintendo in the past couple of years? Triangle Strategy (a game I love btw) sold 800m, which is relatively good for a smaller budget game, and its good if it gets ported, but you’d need to put out like 10 of those a year to equal a Final Fantasy, that sells 7-10 million.
Varteras
Gold Member
Any studio with the money would absolutely gobble up the rights to Final Fantasy. Like, do you even know how to do "bidness?"
FalsettoVibe
Member
I'm not really sure SE is as good a get vs companies like Fromsoft and Capcom.
In my opinion Sony should just go after 2 of the 3:
Fromsoft
CD Project Red
Capcom.
In my opinion Sony should just go after 2 of the 3:
Fromsoft
CD Project Red
Capcom.
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fast_taker
Member
So, are they going to announce the acquisition next Wednesday?
Baki
Member
CD Projekt Red is overpriced ($2.7B value and they only did $207M in revenue last year. To put that into perspective, that's only $17M more than Eidos & Crystal Dynamics)
Fromsoft will be complicated as they have to buy the company from Kadokawa
Capcom is interesting because it would cost more than Square Enix but bring in much less revenue as a company.
Capcom Market Cap: $5.6B
Revenue 2021: $1.06B
Profit 2021: $420M
Square Enix Market Cap: $4.8B
Revenue 2021: $3.14B
Profit 2021: $570M
So not only does Capcom cost about 17% more. Capcom also makes 3X less revenue and 35% less profit. For fun, here is how CD Projekt Red compares:
CD Projekt Red Market Cap: $2.7B
Revenue 2021: $207M
Profit 2021: $56M
Captain Toad
Banned
Ok, we're waiting to hear you out....
Woopah
Member
That's not really true. The launch platforms for Dragon Quest since the PS1 are:
VII - PS1
VIII - PS2
IX - DS
X - Wii
XI - PS4 / 3DS
Sony gets some key exclusives but it's only a small part of SE's total output.
Represent.
Represent(ative) of bad opinions
I’m not talking about the business side of things, I’m talking about for my own personal tastes. I don’t give a damn about any of their games
nominedomine
Banned
MS: "Best I can do is attempt to double the price of Gold".
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DAHGAMING
Gold Member
Because he brings the truth, the truth that he will chat pure shit and we will all piss out of our shity arse holes.
Captain Toad
Banned
Ok, I was not counting the MMO. And XI only came out on 3DS in Japan. In the west it launched as a PS4 exclusive.
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GHound
Member
It'll be the first game to sell three quintillion copies across the galaxy but only if they release it on the Sega Gamecast.
Also I don't remember and a cursory google doesn't turn up anything, but what ever came of the "strategic alliance" with Tencent? If I were a betting man (which I only am on Tuesdays through Mondays.
) I would be betting that Tencent tries to sink their claws into them... or everyone really.
Woopah
Member
Yes if you only look at the Western releases of mainline games then the statement is accurate.
TheThreadsThatBindUs
Member
Square Enix has a reasonable merchandising business. They're also into anime/manga. I can see the synergies for Sony.
FF and DQ are huge and owning those might give Sony hope in keeping PS competitive in Japan against Nintendo.
That said, SE is a huge company and a lot of their publishing business would be redundant.
This could be true if Sony just wants to own them but leave them to their existing multiplat publishing business. I could totally see that. It wouldn't have a major impact on the industry overall.
FF and DQ are huge and owning those might give Sony hope in keeping PS competitive in Japan against Nintendo.
That said, SE is a huge company and a lot of their publishing business would be redundant.
This could be true if Sony just wants to own them but leave them to their existing multiplat publishing business. I could totally see that. It wouldn't have a major impact on the industry overall.
thicc_girls_are_teh_best
Member
Very good technical breakdowns on the finance side of these companies; on ABK, I've felt pretty much from the jump that it was a Microsoft move, not necessarily an Xbox or even GamePass-focused one, exclusively speaking. Your costs-to-revenue-to-profit breakdown basically supports the idea of why they are going to keep all the big ABK IP multiplatform; they are a business and want to recoup the costs in spending.
Even with all of MS funding that acquisition it is going to take a while for pure gaming side to recoup the costs let alone start earning on top of the costs spent. If it were up to Xbox division alone it would take many decades. So I understand their decision with ABK games on that note and why I don't personally believe they'll be putting new COD games Day 1 into GamePass, either; why do that when you're guaranteed to sell millions of copies at full price at launch on all available platforms?
On the topic of Square-Enix and Capcom WRT acquisitions it's interesting SE bring in more profit off a smaller revenue stream. I wonder if it's due to some of their other non-gaming ventures which contribute to that. Do you happen to have these P/E and P/S ratios and amounts for other Japanese publishers like Sega, Konami, Koei-Tecmo and Bandai-Namco, as well?
They could always try a smaller-scale effort in the IP to test the waters, then. Maybe something 2.5D or like what they're doing with some of their JRPG remasters.
Yeah there is definitely room for a new Parasite Eve, however it gets about being made. It's got an American setting but enough of SE's Japanese sensibilities mixed in with that. Strong sci-fi/horror atmosphere with interesting hook (mitochondria evolution), hot blonde gal, etc. 3rd Birthday threw the franchise off but it's been so long, give it another chance.
Would've been cool to see a new Fear Effect, as well, like that cancelled FE3 PS2 game. While SE can no longer do that, maybe Embracer Group decide to bring it back. The recent FE seemed like FE in name only.
I mean there definitely are some signs pointing to possibility of Sony going after SE; again I don't like speculating on these too much before anything's officially confirmed because it feels like all acquisition talk has turned into some form of console warring, even if talk itself involves none of that :S. I wouldn't be surprised tho, if something's cooking between them, it gets announced around June.
A lot of people sleep on SE but they're still more or less at the top when it comes to JRPGs, and they have a ton of great JRPG storylines they can pull from between the Square and Enix stuff. Enix in particular they have some pretty wild gems, publishing games like Planet Laika (100% recommend everyone play that, btw. It finally got an English translation a few months ago) and making stuff like the God Game Trinity (Actraiser, Illusion of Gaia, Terranigma). And that stuff is rife with opportunity for anime & manga adaptations, as well.
I mean FromSoft are king in their own style of RPG and Sega-Atlus have some really strong results between the Yakuza, SMT and Persona games. But still, SE is SE.
RoadHazard
Gold Member
I hope they don't. I don't like much of what SE does nowadays and I want Xbox fans to keep getting that trash.
OsirisBlack
Banned
I could see Sony buying SE simply to lock some of those games up on their system or to charge Nintendo to keep using them. TBH it wouldn't surprise me if they grabbed TWO well known Japanese studios.