Bethesda exec was “confused” over double standard for multi-console Call of Duty

Amid the ongoing regulatory and legal hurdles Microsoft has faced in its proposed $69 billion purchase of Activision, much has been made of the difference between Microsoft’s promise to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation and the company’s moves to bar Bethesda games like Starfield from Sony’s platform. That contrast was large enough, in fact, that a prominent Bethesda executive was bewildered by it in a private email to fellow Bethesda employees last year.

The February 2022 email, which was revealed as part of the Federal Trade Commission trial seeking to block the Activision deal (as noted by Axios’ Steven Totilo), shows Bethesda Senior VP of Global Marketing and Communication Pete Hines perplexed by Microsoft’s public comments at the time regarding keeping Call of Duty on PlayStation consoles going forward. “I’m confused,” Hines writes. “Is [this Call of Duty policy] not the opposite of what we were just asked (told) to do with our own titles? What’s the difference?”

“I understand that there is likely nuance here, but at its core it’s being read as the opposite of what happened with us,” Hines said in a separate email to Microsoft Xbox Chief Phil Spencer the same day.

Regarding the “difference” Hines wonders about, Microsoft has argued in court that Call of Duty’s status as an “existing, multi-player, cross-platform” franchise makes it less comparable to Starfield and more akin to Minecraft, which Microsoft has continued to publish on multiple platforms after acquiring the franchise in 2014.

The adjectives that Microsoft uses to set Call of Duty and Minecraft apart also apply to Bethesda franchises like Fallout 76 and The Elder Scrolls Online, which have remained multi-console under Microsoft. But in response briefs, the FTC argued that Microsoft’s “multi-hyphenated description” of these games is “the surest sign of defendants’ struggle to distinguish Activision’s content from ZeniMax’s.”

Why didn’t anyone warn us?

In his 2022 email to his fellow Bethesda employees, Hines also takes some umbrage at being caught flat-footed by Microsoft’s Call of Duty announcement. “Did anyone at Xbox think about giving us a heads-up on this?” Hines continued in his 2022 email. “Todd [Howard]’s going to DICE in a couple weeks, you don’t think a journo might find him and press him on why the below is ok for COD or any Activision Blizzard games, but not [The Elder Scrolls VI] or Starfield?”

When pressed on Starfield exclusivity by the Telegraph in 2021, Howard noted that “you don’t ever want to leave people out… but at the end of the day, your ability to focus and say, ‘this is the game I want to make, these are the platforms I want to make it on,’ and being able to really lean in on those is going to make for a better product.”

Is [this Call of Duty policy] not the opposite of what we were just asked (told) to do with our own titles? What’s the difference?

Bethesda Senior VP Pete Hines, in a 2022 email

Howard echoed a similar sentiment in a late 2022 podcast interview, saying that “from a development side, I like the ability to focus… and have help from them—the top engineers at Xbox, to say ‘we are going to make this look incredible on the new systems’ is, from my standpoint, it’s just awesome.”

Around the time of Hines’ email, Microsoft’s Spencer was publicly saying that he hoped Starfield would be Bethesda’s most-played RPG ever despite the missing PlayStation gamers and that console players would essentially vote with their wallets if they wanted access to the game.

“That specific question of, ‘Hey, there’s only one place that I want to play games, and if that game doesn’t end up on the one place that I want to play… those people can go play those games… They’re just going to say, I’m choosing not to because it’s not on the one device…” Spencer said.

Hines’ mention of a Microsoft-exclusive Elder Scrolls VI in his email is noteworthy because Spencer recently refused to confirm that game’s eventual platforms on the stand in the FTC trial. In a 2021 interview, Spencer had previously said Elder Scrolls VI would mirror Starfield by only appearing on Xbox and PC.

Hines is also the Bethesda executive who publicly apologized to PlayStation owners in a June 2021 interview regarding Starfield‘s Microsoft exclusivity. “All I can say is I apologize because I’m certain that that’s frustrating to folks, but there’s not a whole lot I can do about it,” Hines said at the time, a message that has since been referenced in the FTC’s legal briefs.

Testimony in the FTC trial will continue today and is expected to run through Thursday. A decision in the case should follow in the coming weeks.

https://arstechnica.com/?p=1950170