Microsoft has released an emotional trailer to celebrate its acquisition of Activision Blizzard, showcasing the wealth of games Xbox now owns (and seemingly what it finds most important and wants to show off).
The titles that now come under the Xbox Games Studios banner is a little eye-watering, with some of video games’ biggest franchises of all time featuring in the trailer. World of Warcraft, Call of Duty, Diablo, Crash Bandicoot, and Candy Crush all feature alongside franchises Xbox already owned like Halo, Fallout, Forza, and Starfield.
The trailer (above) was released alongside Microsoft’s announcement that it now owns Activision Blizzard, with the $68.7 billion deal the biggest in gaming history. You can read about the full acquisition, from its reveal in January 2022 to completion in October 2023, in IGN’s full timeline outlining all the challenges Microsoft had to overcome.
Xbox uses its franchises to welcome Activision, Blizzard, and mobile publisher King into its company. A World of Warcraft cutscene, for example, has one character say: “This is home now. Family.” Another from Pyschonauts 2 replied: “That’s cute.”
It’s Starcraft’s Tychus Findlay who perhaps best sums up what Microsoft and Activision Blizzard is feeling at the moment, however. “Activision, Blizzard, [and] King join the Xbox family,” the trailer reads, before Findlay chimed in: “It’s about time.”
Other games featured in the trailer include Microsoft Flight Simulator, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, Sea of Thieves, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, Fallout Shelter, Spyro, Minecraft, Hi-Fi Rush, and Doom Eternal.
Plenty of other news is arriving alongside Xbox’s announcement, of course, including that controversial Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick will remain boss the Call of Duty maker until the end of 2023. Kotick said Xbox boss Phil Spencer had asked him to stick around as CEO to the end of this year, suggesting an exit in 2024.
Ryan Dinsdale is an IGN freelance reporter. He’ll talk about The Witcher all day.