Microsoft decided to buy out Bethesda when Starfield almost became a PS5 exclusive

, by Thibaut

Microsoft decided to buy out Bethesda when Starfield almost became a PS5 exclusive

Prior to Microsoft's takeover of ZeniMax Media (Bethesda Softworks' parent company), Sony had managed to secure Deathloop and Ghostwire: Tokyo as console exclusives for the PS5. And if we are to believe the American manufacturer, PlayStation had no intention of stopping there.

During the FTC hearing against Microsoft (for the acquisition of Activision Blizzard), Xbox boss Phil Spencer revealed that Sony had also tried to make Starfield a PlayStation 5 exclusive. To prevent this from happening, Microsoft chose to buy Bethesda Softworks.

"When we acquired ZeniMax one of the impetus for that is that Sony had done a deal for Deathloop and Ghostwire... to pay Bethesda to not ship those games on Xbox,” said Spencer. “So the discussion about Starfield when we heard that Starfield was potentially also going to end up skipping Xbox, we can’t be in a position as a third-place console where we fall further behind on our content ownership so we’ve had to secure content to remain viable in the business."

Source: theverge.com

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