$2.9 billion: Microsoft's Game Pass earnings revealed

The Ministry of Consumer Protection in Brazil has approved the acquisition of Microsoft Activision-Blizzard and reveals interesting data

Giving in Nishi

10/10/2022

Monday, October 10, 2022, 10:30 p.m

• Share on Facebook

• Share on WhatsApp

• Share on Twitter

• Share by email

• Share in general

• Comments

  Comments

Game Pass (Microsoft)

Last January, Microsoft made one of the biggest deals the gaming industry has ever known and bought the gaming giant Activision-Blizzard for a whopping $68.9 billion.

In recent months, quite a few regulatory bodies around the world are examining the issue, and recently the Ministry of Economic Consumer Protection in Brazil approved the deal and releases summary documents that are open to the public and reveal some interesting data to us - such as Microsoft's earnings from its Game Pass service.

According to the data, it seems that by the end of January 2021, Microsoft's profits

.

It was also revealed that the total profits amount to 16.28 billion dollars (including the consoles and other services), the Game Pass makes up about 18% of the amount.

Considering that almost a year has passed since then, there is little doubt that these numbers have only increased.

For comparison, you can see that Nintendo earned $932 million, EA $356 million, and Sony did not disclose numbers.

The documents submitted by the Ministry of Consumer Protection in Brazil (Photo: screenshot, Tweaktown)

The documents submitted by the Ministry of Consumer Protection in Brazil (Photo: screenshot, Tweaktown)

In January of that year, Microsoft claimed that its service had 18 million players.

In January of this year, Microsoft reported that this number had jumped to 25 million players.

The report states that the full amount (2.9 million) refers to players who subscribe to the service through the consoles, and there is no reference to PC players.

This report still leaves several questions and doubts.

There is no reference to micro-purchases and DLC purchases made through the service, or game discounts offered to players.

The number of subscribers in the different levels (standard or ultimate) was not revealed precisely either.

The documents submitted by the Ministry of Consumer Protection in Brazil (photo: screenshot, tweaktown)

Since the approval processes began, Sony has not stopped trying to prevent the acquisition of Activision-Blizzard.

First, she argued that the exclusivity of a brand like Call of Duty for the Xbox console would hurt sales and tip the scales in Microsoft's favor in the console war.

Sony applied to the competition offices in Brazil and England, which were denied.

Recently, it was reported that the CEO of Sony (Jim Ryan) flew to Brussels to meet with regulators in the European Union "and expressed to them concern" about the deal.

Microsoft, for its part, claimed that the success of the Call of Duty titles was inflated by Sony, and the success of the Game Pass service came Even before the purchase of Activision-Blizzard, which has not yet come to fruition, Microsoft also claimed that Sony is not afraid of the purchase itself, but of the fact that the Game Pass service undermines the model that Sony advocates - where players are required to purchase the console and its exclusive content.

Sony is trying to prevent the Activision-Blizzard deal and making Call of Duty an exclusive brand for Xbox (photo: official website, Activision)

Furthermore, Microsoft stated in the report that the move of making Voice of Duty exclusive is not as profitable for it as Sony claims, and there is logic behind it: the company will miss out on the PlayStation players who will purchase in the game's digital stores. Furthermore, Phil Spencer has already explicitly stated in the past that Xbox There is no intention to "break up player communities", and said that the brand will remain with Sony for several more years.

• The gaming channel

• the magazine

Tags

• Gaming

• Microsoft

• Activision Blizzard

• XBox