At a hearing on the FTC's current lawsuit against Microsoft, Xbox boss Phil Spencer explained that one of the reasons the company bought ZeniMax Media, the holding company that owns Bethesda Softworks, was the fear that "Starfield" might not be released on the Xbox He explained that one of the reasons the company acquired ZeniMax Media, the holding company that owns Bethesda Softworks, was the fear that Starfield might not be released on Xbox. Bethesda had signed timed exclusivity deals with Sony for two other games, which kept them off the Xbox until a year after their release.

"When we acquired ZeniMax, one of the triggers was that Sony had signed agreements with us for Deathloop and Ghostwire (Tokyo) to pay Bethesda not to ship those games on Xbox," The Verge Spencer said via The Verge. "So when we heard that Starfield might also be skipping Xbox, the argument about Starfield was that we can't be in a position as the third largest console to fall further behind in content ownership, so in order to stay in business we we had to secure the content."

The content had to be secured.

Spencer explained in court that releasing games on both consoles gave Sony money, which was then spent on competitors. He said, "Every time we release a game on PlayStation.... Every time we ship a game on PlayStation, Sony receives ...... Sony gets 30% of the revenue generated by the platform, and they use that money to try to reduce Xbox's viability in the marketplace. We're trying to compete, but as I said, we haven't been able to do that effectively over the last 20 years."

When asked if The Elder Scrolls 6 is meant to be an exclusive title for Xbox and PC, Spencer remained vague." Given how far out the game is, he was a bit unclear as to which platforms it would be released on.

Spencer said."

The first Bethesda game to skip PlayStation since the acquisition was Redfall, released in May, and Spencer personally apologized for its "disappointing" launch, not a stinging blow in the war with Sony.

The United States is not alone in blocking Microsoft's proposed $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard. Trade commissions in several countries are either trying to block the deal or remain undecided. Here is a handy map of the countries that are blocking the Microsoft-Activision acquisition.