Bethesda head of publishing Pete Hines is not happy about the company’s games becoming Xbox exclusives, according to an email presented in Microsoft’s ongoing court hearing with the US Federal Trade Commission regarding the acquisition of Activision Blizzard. Hines expresses his disappointment at Xbox’s agreement to keep the Call of Duty series and other popular titles multi-platform before stating that Bethesda’s own titles never got the same arrangements and treatment.
Hines emailed ZeniMax and Bethesda executives, including Todd Howard, around the time that Xbox revealed its plans to keep the Call of Duty series multi-platform once Activision Blizzard was acquired. Hines seems annoyed that Bethesda wasn’t given a heads-up about the deal and questioned why Call of Duty‘s non-exclusivity arrangement, as well as other popular titles from the publisher, was the “opposite” of what Xbox imposed on Bethesda’s own titles.
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Below is the first email that Hines sent to ZeniMax leadership as well as Howard, detailing his frustration:
Hines sent a second email to Xbox boss Phil Spencer to address these concerns, albeit in a more polite tone. Hines asks Spencer why Bethesda received the “opposite” treatment of what Microsoft proposed for a number of Activision Blizzard IPs while seeming disgruntled at the fact that Bethesda didn’t have any option or say in the exclusivity matter. The email reads:
These emails from Hines seem to contradict his previous statement about Starfield‘s exclusivity in which he said that keeping the anticipated sci-fi RPG to Xbox consoles was the “right thing to do” from a development standpoint.
Nonetheless, it’s interesting to get a peak behind the curtain and see Bethesda’s real feelings on the matter of Xbox exclusivity, especially considering that a large majority of Bethesda-published games have historically appeared on PlayStation consoles and assisted with its massive sales numbers, including Skyrim: Special Edition and Fallout 4, last generation.
Source: PlayStation LifeStyle
