Just a few years ago, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) fought to block Microsoft's $70 billion giga-acquisition of Activision Blizzard, arguing that the deal is bad for competition, customers, and workers. Now, wouldn't you know, industry consolidation is bad no matter who it is that's doing the consolidating, and the FTC's former chair chimed into the recent discourse to basically say 'I told you so.'
"Microsoft's acquisition of Activision has been followed by significant price hikes and layoffs, harming both gamers and developers," Lina Khan, whose FTC moved to block the acquisition, recently tweeted. "As we've seen across sectors, increasing market consolidation and increasing prices often go hand-in-hand. As dominant firms become too-big-to-care, they can make things worse for their customers without having to worry about the consequences."
Khan's reminder comes hot off Microsoft's announcement that Xbox Game Pass Ultimate is getting a whopping 50% price increase, alongside upgrades that no one really asked for, like Fortnite Crew and Ubisoft Classics being folded into the subscription.
It also comes months after Microsoft laid off a ton of workers, shut down a studio, and cancelled a handful of games including the Perfect Dark reboot, Rare's Everwild, and Contraband, that co-op heist game from the Just Cause devs.
Bloomberg just yesterday reported that Microsoft lost about $300 million in Call of Duty sales by putting last year's entry onto Game Pass on launch day, which likely played a big factor in this latest price bump.
