Game Developer in the World of Anime

Activision Blizzard's market value had remained high, even with the company plagued by all sorts of chaotic decisions in recent years. Its valuation still sat at around $60–70 billion. And now, just the news of Microsoft's acquisition caused a sudden spike in their stock price.

After reading through reports from multiple media outlets and getting a solid grasp of the situation, Ichin closed his browser, ready to dig into a proper discussion with his viewers.

Turning his head, he noticed Kō Yagami and the others had already stepped out—and even thoughtfully closed the bedroom door behind them.

"Well then, I guess you're all a lot more interested in Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard right now," Ichin said with a lazy stretch and a grin. "Didn't expect this at all. I just planned to casually stream a bit today, and boom—this kind of megaton drops. Gotta hand it to Microsoft. Money power is scary."

He continued, "Some people are asking, 'Why would Microsoft spend that much money to buy Activision Blizzard?' After all, both Activision and Blizzard aren't what they used to be. And that's true—they've declined. But even so, the value they still hold is enormous."

He paused, intending to sip something to refresh his throat—only to realize the juice he'd brought in earlier was already gone.

Just as he was thinking of heading out to grab more, Utaha entered with perfect timing, carrying a bottle of soda.

"I saw you ran out, so I brought you another one," she said with a smile, placing the cola on his desk. "Kō and the others are in the living room. Keep streaming—we'll be fine chatting on our own."

Ichin nodded, gently pinched Utaha's cheek, and let her go.

Then, addressing his jealous audience, he smirked, "Alright, alright, don't be envious. You can't copy this even if you tried."

With that cheeky comment out of the way, Ichin returned to discussing the acquisition.

"Let's put Blizzard aside for now and talk Activision. In my opinion, the reason Microsoft wants this deal is primarily because of Activision and the studios and IPs under its belt. Take the Call of Duty series for example—yes, it's been phoning it in lately, focusing on online multiplayer and totally neglecting single-player campaigns. And even when they do make a campaign, it's trash. But you have to admit, COD still racks up massive sales numbers every year. It's always among the top-selling titles."

Just as Ichin reached this point, everyone understood what he was hinting at.

"Oh crap... is COD going to be exclusive to Xbox now?"

Not quite. It's not coming to Switch either—that much is certain.

But then again, the Switch doesn't need it. They've got Splatoon, and even ports of older games like Crysis are doing fine.

Seeing the chat spam predictions and reactions, Ichin chuckled, "I'm not saying they'll definitely remove COD from Sony platforms—"

He didn't even get to finish before the chat exploded with a flood of titles that Activision might abandon sequels for.

Letting them run wild with speculation, Ichin relaxed with a long sip of cola before continuing.

"Alright, now let's talk Blizzard. This is where it really gets interesting. I'm not going to bring up Blizzard's internal drama—it's just too messy. If you're curious, you can look it up yourselves. Since this is a console-focused stream, let's just talk about Blizzard's IPs: Warcraft, Starcraft, Hearthstone, Overwatch... oh, and Heroes of the Storm too."

"Take Warcraft Reforged—I'm sure a lot of you were disgusted by that disaster. And Starcraft? Still no new game. I get it—RTS games are niche now, so I can understand not making another one."

"But let's focus on Overwatch. That game exploded when it launched—blazing hot, even kicked off a whole esports scene. It had so much potential. And yet, look where it is now. Overwatch 2? We haven't even seen real news about it. I'd bet they haven't made much progress at all. A ton of Blizzard's key developers already jumped ship."

"You've got such a valuable IP, and you don't expand the lore, don't build side games with new mechanics, don't even pump out CG shorts? You could've made an entire 'Overwatch Universe' or something. But nah—not even interested in making money properly."

That take had chat going absolutely wild in agreement.

"Facts. Look at Riot—they turned League of Legends into a whole universe. And Blizzard? Can't even squeeze out a single fart."

"Honestly, the only real Overwatch CGs are from the 3D art community."

"Nah, Tifa is still the true goddess of 3D."

"True that. Tifa is peak."

"Alright, boys, brb. Need a two-minute break."

Everyone was spiraling off-topic again, as usual.

Ichin shook his head and sighed with a grin. Then he took another big gulp of cola and said, "Alright, that's the short version of things. I don't know when this acquisition will be finalized, and I don't have a clue how Microsoft will handle all these new IPs either. We'll just have to wait and see."

"And personally? I'm really curious how Sony will respond."

That was easily one of the hottest discussion points after the announcement.

Would Sony collapse? Should Nintendo hurry up and buy Capcom? Now that Microsoft's flexing its wallet, why not go buy Konami too?

The jokes and wild takes were endless—and fun.

It reminded Ichin of a conversation at work before the end-of-December break, when everyone had been talking about Pokémon and Game Freak.

Today, something as absurd as Microsoft acquiring Activision Blizzard had become reality—so who's to say Pokémon, the world's top IP, couldn't one day have a proper rebirth?

As someone who grew up with Pokémon, Ichin didn't say anything out loud, but deep down he still held a bit of hope.

Not hope in Game Freak—but hope in the Pokémon IP itself.

As for playing Hollow Knight? Yeah, Ichin wasn't really in the mood anymore.

After chatting with viewers a bit longer, he wrapped up the stream.

No one was upset that he ended early—after all, the Microsoft-Activision bombshell gave them plenty to talk about.

*

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