Activision Blizzard to buy 'Candy Crush' maker King for $5.9 Billion

[Kelimbror]

I just saw this and was coming to post....I'm not amused. It makes sense, and really this is 'Activision' buying this, but uggh. After the whole fiasco trying to sue people for using the word candy or w/e, I feel like associating with this company is the plague.

But I guess it's smart to try and get in on the mobile market by buying one of the most popular products out there. Combined with Hearthstone's success they have a pretty strong mobile portfolio now.

[Deleted]

The Saga of Warcraft - Coming soon to a mobile device near you

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The mobile market is plagued by nothing but hipster games and freemium trash, even the best sellers are basic and freemium to thier core, Can you think of any mobile games that are even on the same level as a gameboy game? Almost every single one is made for the cheap and fast buck and to trick people into spending cash to not have to wait.

You're acting like these old fucks that don't even play games care. They see they can get a few more bucks by fucking over consumers because ignorant fucks eat that shit right up. Can't wait for that whole market to collapse so that only the ones that see it isn't a long time investment and is an unstable market to invest in stay standing.

[Dejablue]

I'm fairly sure this is mostly Activision's doing, and not the people behind Blizzard who made happen. Even if they're the same company now.

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The amount of users make the money well worth it.

Yea, and Titan wasnt canceled because Activision is publishing Destiny...

[Ratyrel]

I'm not sure this is a smart move. Perhaps King is established enough, but most mobile developers seem to suffer from the fact that they produce one hugely successful hit game and then never bring out anything worthwhile after that, making acquiring them pointless. The mobile market is one huge viral fad with the attention span of a baby; unlike Blizzard games, which have a very large and very loyal fanbase and strong brand recognition, mobile games and their consume and delete usage patterns do not retain customers based on brand.

[ro9ue]

Activision-Blizzard basically just entered the same category I put EA and Ubisoft in. Large developers that just want to make money and no longer care about a quality product.

[Blade Wolf]

Activision-Blizzard basically just entered the same category I put EA and Ubisoft in. Large developers that just want to make money and no longer care about a quality product.

Let's pray that AB doesn't do what EA does to the developers they "eat up"

[Gutler]

Let's pray that AB doesn't do what EA does to the developers they "eat up"

I disagree King is a horrible company that needs to be driven out of existence.

[Gilian]

Saw an article sometime back citing mobile devices as the most popular game platform among the 2-17 year old demographic. Unless something radical changes in platform technology, that's the direction things are going to move as time passes. I'm not saying it's a good or bad thing, but the writing is on the wall.

It's not moving anywhere. This is just a different market they want to get in on and make some more billions of dollars. This market has grown a lot because now nearly everyone has a smartphone or tablet (3 year olds play on their parents ipad and kids in middle school all have iphones too). It will expand even more in one or two generations when more, if not all, grandparents also have smartphones and they become even more accessible.
Console and PC as gaming platforms aren't even close to being the same experience as mobile devices. It's not like people are actively chosing between a mobile device or a console to play videogames on.

[Dhrizzle]

Activision-Blizzard basically just entered the same category I put EA and Ubisoft in. Large developers that just want to make money and no longer care about a quality product.

Activision have been that for years. If anything I find Activision to be worse. EA give their developers quite a lot of freedom as to what they want to do with their games, the only problem is once an idea has been pitched and accepted EA hold them to it even if some features turn out to be broken or simply bad. Activision tend to release products that work better on release, but they're much less ambitious with them.

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I'm not sure this is a smart move. Perhaps King is established enough, but most mobile developers seem to suffer from the fact that they produce one hugely successful hit game and then never bring out anything worthwhile after that, making acquiring them pointless. The mobile market is one huge viral fad with the attention span of a baby; unlike Blizzard games, which have a very large and very loyal fanbase and strong brand recognition, mobile games and their consume and delete usage patterns do not retain customers based on brand.

Take King's experience with the mobile market and add recognisable IPs that are owned by Activision. Congratulations you now have all the money.

[lawow74]

It's not moving anywhere. This is just a different market they want to get in on and make some more billions of dollars. This market has grown a lot because now nearly everyone has a smartphone or tablet (3 year olds play on their parents ipad and kids in middle school all have iphones too). It will expand even more in one or two generations when more, if not all, grandparents also have smartphones and they become even more accessible.
Console and PC as gaming platforms aren't even close to being the same experience as mobile devices. It's not like people are actively chosing between a mobile device or a console to play videogames on.

It's a different market...for now. Like I said, the writing is on the wall. The move is on to mobile devices as the center of information technology, away from the desktop. I imagine they'll remain a part of the market for some time to come, but they won't be the majority or focus. By the same token, consoles are going to merge with mobile technology as well(Nintendo is already talking about mobile device integration and I'm sure Sony and Microsoft won't be far behind).

They'll find ways to adapt control schemes, that being the only major advantage console and PC platforms have right now over mobile, as computing power keeps jumping ahead at a steady pace. Innovation will inevitably change how things are done. It won't happen overnight. But in five years? Ten years? Wait and see what happens.

[McNeil]

Activision-Blizzard basically just entered the same category I put EA and Ubisoft in. Large developers that just want to make money and no longer care about a quality product.

They've entered that category long ago. If anything I'd call them worse than both EA and Ubisoft.

[Edge-]

The mobile market is plagued by nothing but hipster games and freemium trash, even the best sellers are basic and freemium to thier core

And?... They generate stupid amounts of money at an extremely low cost when they hit, and are minimal losses when they miss. Low risk ventures with the potential for high payouts is a pretty attractive offer, especially when you're used to making big gambles like AAA companies do.

Can you think of any mobile games that are even on the same level as a gameboy game? Almost every single one is made for the cheap and fast buck and to trick people into spending cash to not have to wait.

Again, entirely irrelevant to these publishers/developers bottom line and finances.

[lawow74]

And?... They generate stupid amounts of money at an extremely low cost when they hit, and are minimal losses when they miss. Low risk ventures with the potential for high payouts is a pretty attractive offer, especially when you're used to making big gambles like AAA companies do.

Exactly so. If Konami wants to make money on their existing IP's in the PC and console market, they can always farm out to other studios that want to take the risk developing those big blockbuster titles, and get a guaranteed ROI in the licensing plus a percentage of the game profits. They let other people take the big risk while they fire out all the low to medium risk stuff.

[stellvia]

Activision-Blizzard basically just entered the same category I put EA and Ubisoft in. Large developers that just want to make money and no longer care about a quality product.

They entered that category awhile ago already, honestly. Fanfiction/AU plots for latest two WoW expansions. Hearthstone RNG flash card game. HotS MOBA to compete with Riot for basement-level click-spam market. Overwatch now to go up against TF2 with the addition of cranking up the item shop angle with selling heroes, keeping the skill ceiling super low at the same time for maximum penetration, etc.

It's an odd thing to watch, as they basically put a high level of "polish" into them still, but its like polishing a turd, because what they make these days isn't worth of the gameplay we came to expect from them in the past. Now it's all about the broadest market possible, gameplay be damned.

[DeadmanWalking]

Its a good business move, will make the comany a lot of profit and not cause it's customers any problems. The only people who are trying to paint this as a bad thing are people who get upset when companies are successful, which are what companies are designed to do. Are they cutting down the rainforest? Are they dumping oil into the oceans? Are they hiring scientists to tell you their cancer sticks don't cause cancer? Are they putting bullet shells into peoples mailboxes to shut them up? No? So go ahead and back the money truck up to the building and keep tossing the money in until the building is filled to the brim and they have to build another building to carry their pocket change for all I care. They make more money and they hire more people and more people can feed their families and buy coffee from hipsters so hispters can sit on their corporate made laptops and bitch about corporate greed on the internet they bought from a corporation.

[Halicia]

It's an odd thing to watch, as they basically put a high level of "polish" into them still, but its like polishing a turd, because what they make these days isn't worth of the gameplay we came to expect from them in the past. Now it's all about the broadest market possible, gameplay be damned.

Maybe the games were "challenging" to you in the past because you were new to gaming at the time, but this is the same thing they've always done.

Blizzard has never been the innovator. They took what worked in other recent games, and compiled it into a game of the same genre with a better UI. The games were never particularly difficult as far as the relevant genre goes, which feeds into their popularity. There's nothing wrong with a game being accessible and easy to learn.

I'm surprised King hadn't been snatched up already, but it might be kinda disturbing if they continue with their lawsuits with even more clout behind them.