Activision Blizzard News, Tips, Tricks & Ideas

One of the most hotly-anticipated game releases left of 2023 is Bethesda’s massive sci-fi RPG Starfield, but will it ever come to PS5?

Following player complaints, Blizzard has released a Diablo 4 patch which makes it harder for users to accidentally activate the game’s Premium Battle Pass.

Blizzard has said it’s looking at tweaking the menu design of Diablo 4 because some players claim it’s making them activate their Premium Battle Pass by accident.

Microsoft's Activision Blizzard deal is back in the hands of Britain's antitrust regulator after an appeals court granted an adjournment, and the grounds for why the UK should reconsider its block on the US software giant's takeover were published.

After recent court losses preventing the agency from preventing Microsoft’s deal to acquire Activision Blizzard from closing, the United States Federal Trade Commission has suspended its internal administrative challenge to the deal. A hearing was set to begin in early August if the process were to continue at this time.

Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot has commented on Microsoft's takeover bid of Activision Blizzard, stating it validates Ubisoft's decision to expand into mobile gaming.

Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot has said Microsoft’s bid to acquire Activision Blizzard can be viewed as a sign that Ubisoft is on the right track with its current business strategy.

As Microsoft’s proposed $69 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard edges closer to its long overdue completion, discussions about whether a deal of this scale and nature is ultimately going to benefit the industry or just Microsoft itself continue to rage on, but it seems another major player in the industry is, at the very least, all for it.

Hogwarts Legacy was comfortably Europe’s best-selling game in the first half of 2023.

The Microsoft/Activision Blizzard merger is closer than ever to fruition. Earlier this week, the US Supreme Court has denied, in the person of Justice Elena Kagan, the request filed by a group of gamers for an emergency injunction to block the deal. Not that such a request was reasonably likely to be granted, especially after the Federal Trade Commission was turned down.

The US Federal Trade Commission official on Thursday withdrew the agency's case before an in-house judge that sought to block Microsoft's $69 billion (roughly Rs. 5,66,200 crore) acquisition of game-maker Activision.

Kotick discussed the deal in a recent interview.

The US Federal Trade Commission has withdrawn its proceedings against Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard. According to IGN, the FTC responded to Microsoft’s motion to withdraw from the recent proceedings with no objections, essentially giving Microsoft the green light to go ahead with its $69 billion acquisition.

As reported in The Verge, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is suspending its administrative challenge to Microsoft's $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard. This comes after the FTC's request for emergency relief was denied in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, and not long after a motion Microsoft and Activision Blizzard filed earlier to get the FTC from trying to block their proposed merger.

US antitrust agency the Federal Trade Commission is reportedly preparing to pause its upcoming in-house trial focussing on Microsoft's proposed $69bn USD acquisition of Activision Blizzard, potentially paving the way for settlement talks between the various parties.

There’s been plenty going on recently with Activision Blizzard, with the biggest thing being how the company has gotten the green light to be bought by Microsoft, potentially changing the gaming landscape as a result. But the other big piece of news hitting the internet is talk about the future of the Overwatch League. If you recall, this massive eSports league was supposed to be a “game-changer” on how eSports were done and push Activision Blizzard to new heights and popularity. But it didn’t work out that way, and now many wonder if the league will continue as we know it.

Blizzard is set to host a Diablo 4 ‘Campfire Chat’ on Friday to address fan feedback to the game’s latest major update.

Microsoft and Activision Blizzard have filed a motion urging the FTC to stop trying to block their proposed merger.

Following a fast-tracked trial with multiple revelations, the US Federal Trade Commission’s injunction to halt the acquisition of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft was denied in court. It then filed for an appeal last week, which was also denied. Nevertheless, it’s not giving up just yet, as Reuters reports that it brought the case to an internal FTC administrative judge, with a trial scheduled for August 2nd.

Activision Blizzard has made a round of layoffs at its esports division, while confirming that big changes may be in store for the Overwatch League.

Activision Blizzard has laid off around 50 staff from its esports division.

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The deadline on Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard has been extended to October 18 this year, giving the companies more time to convince the UK government to reverse its decision to block the deal. 

Microsoft and Activision Blizzard have renegotiated the deadline for concluding the proposed acquisition of the Call of Duty publisher, giving them more leeway to conclude the discussions with market regulators with a new deadline to complete by 18th October 2023.

In its recent earnings report, Activision Blizzard has admitted that player investment and engagement with Overwatch 2 has been in decline. The publisher revealed that the competitive shooter has “declined sequentially” this quarter.

The sun finally came out for Microsoft. On 11 July, Judge Jacqueline Corley ruled in favor of the Redmond, Washington-based company in its dispute against the United States Federal Trade Commission (FTC) over the purchase of Activision Blizzard, one of the world's largest video game developers. An appeal by the FTC to temporarily halt the deal was denied by an appellate court late last week.

In case there was any doubt (and I'm pretty sure there wasn't, but just in case), Activision Blizzard said in its latest financial report that Diablo 4 is Blizzard's fastest-selling game of all time, and helped the company reach $1 billion in net bookings (that's total sales, basically) in a single quarter for the first time ever.

Microsoft and Activision Blizzard have renegotiated the deadline for concluding the proposed acquisition of the Call of Duty publisher, giving them more leeway to conclude the discussions with market regulators with a new deadline to complete by 18th October 2023.

Activision Blizzard has laid off around 50 employees, according to a new report from The Verge. 

Amid the pending takeover of Activision Blizzard by Microsoft, the former has laid off around 50 employees from its esports division. The company is also preparing for some potential huge changes to the Overwatch League (OWL), which may bring an end to its city-based franchise format.

Activision Blizzard said on Wednesday that over 10 million players “experienced” Diablo 4 during its launch month.

Microsoft and Activision Blizzard are pushing back a notable deadline in the ongoing merger talks. Originally set for July 18, the merger agreement deadline for the companies has now been pushed out to October 18.

When it comes to Activision Blizzard, we know that we can expect a new Call of Duty game to drop yearly. We know the developers are working on a new Call of Duty game for this year, but what it is remains a mystery. We got a small tease over the game just yesterday, which is when we can expect a proper reveal. But today, we have yet another small little update on the game project, and it’s thanks to a recent earnings call.

Layoffs among esports staff and an upcoming vote could spell the end of the OWL.

Amid the final days of the Activision Blizzard / Microsoft deal, Activision Blizzard is laying off workers in its esports department while also preparing for potentially huge changes coming to the Overwatch League.

Microsoft and Activision Blizzard have extended the deadline for their $69 billion merger by three months “to work through the final regulatory issues,” according to Microsoft president Brad Smith. The two companies had failed to meet their previous self-imposed deadline of yesterday, July 18th, and Microsoft have now avoided paying a $3 billion fine by renegotiating a new deadline: October 18th.

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Call of Duty has around 90 million monthly players, with half of all Call of Duty engagement on mobile, Activision Blizzard has revealed.

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Microsoft has extended its merger agreement deadline with Activision Blizzard and now has until October 18, 2023, to complete its $68.7 billion acquisition of the Call of Duty publisher. The deal had initially been expected to complete by July 18.

Microsoft and Activision Blizzard have extended the deadline of their proposed merger until 18th October this year.

There has been a lot of chatter regarding Microsoft and its attempt to acquire Activision Blizzard. The company has sent out a massive bid to make the deal happen, and things have been anything but smooth. Regulators are going through this deal; fortunately for Microsoft, most have given the green light. Meanwhile, the FTC lost a court case against Microsoft over this deal, so it left it to the CMA. This UK regulator initially shot down the deal earlier this year, which prompted an appeal from Microsoft. Fast forward to the present day, and you might have known that yesterday was the deadline for this deal to go through.

Microsoft and Activision Blizzard have agreed to extend their merger agreement until October 18, 2023.

That a deal as massive in scale as Microsoft’s proposed $69 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard has been under as much scrutiny as it has hasn’t been a surprise to anyone, though it has nonetheless been held up longer than most parties involved would have expected. Nonetheless, with Microsoft having been given the green light for the deal in the US and also currently being in the process of negotiating the deal with the UK’s CMA, it does seem like it’s edging closer to completion.

Microsoft and Activision Blizzard now have until October to complete their merger. 

By Tom Warren, a senior editor covering Microsoft, PC gaming, console, and tech. He founded WinRumors, a site dedicated to Microsoft news, before joining The Verge in 2012.

Activision Blizzard said on Wednesday it has extended the deadline for the close of its $69 billion (roughly Rs. 5,66,200 crore) takeover by Microsoft to October 18 as the companies work to secure approval from the United Kingdom's antitrust authority.

Microsoft and Activision Blizzard have agreed to extend the deadline for the closure of Microsoft’s proposed acquisition of Activision Blizzard from July 18 to October 18 to allow for additional time to resolve remaining regulatory concerns, the companies announced.

We’ve reached the point with Microsoft’s proposed $69 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard where it’s likely only a matter of time before the deal closes, but the trillion dollar tech titan still has some hurdles to overcome with the UK’s regulator. While it’s returned to the negotiating table with the Competition and Markets Authority, the original deadline for the deal closing was 18th July.

Microsoft’s $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard, the publisher of Call of Duty, World of Warcraft, and Overwatch, has been delayed past its July 18 deadline, the companies announced Wednesday. The deadline has been extended until Oct. 18 as Microsoft and Activision negotiate with the U.K.’s antitrust regulator, the Competition and Markets Authority.

The US Supreme Court has denied the latest effort by a group of gamers to block Microsoft's Activision Blizzard acquisition.