Activision-Blizzard: Game streaming services need us
Activision-Blizzard’s CEO believes his company is in a good position to take advantage of the arrival of game streaming services. According to him, the big companies don’t know how to make good games for the platforms.
Activision-Blizzard CEO Robert Kotick said while discussing Q1 2019 numbers that his company is better equipped than most to take advantage of the upcoming game streaming platforms. “If you own 30 years of intellectual property like us, there’s probably no better time to be in the game business.” Seeking Alpha publishes a transcript of the discussion.
According to Kotick, “big companies with a lot of money” are building platforms while having few games to offer to customers. The CEO thinks the companies want to appeal to a large audience and make significant investments. “None of those platforms can do without good content. Honestly, they don’t really know how to make it.” He thinks Activision-Blizzard’s support is necessary for the game streaming services to gain audiences.
It is expected that the streaming of games will take off. Google announced its Stadia game streaming service and Microsoft is coming with xCloud. In addition, Amazon and Verizon are working on cloud services for games, and Sony and Nvidia already have streaming services for games. Google has set up its own game studio to make its own games for its platform, but the company will probably have to turn to third-party publishers for well-known titles to make Stadia a success. Those publishers hope to be able to earn a lot from this, according to the statements of Activision-Blizzard.
Activision-Blizzard had quarterly revenue of $1.82 billion, less than the company’s $1.97 billion in the first quarter of 2018. The company sees 2019 as a transition year, in which it will not release any major releases. This year, the company focuses on e-sports and mobile games, such as Call of Duty Mobile, which will be released in June. The publisher did point to the success of action game Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. Of those, the company sold two million units in less than ten days.