Microsoft’s US$68.7 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard is not going down well with regulators with the Redmond-giant having to respond to both the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the UK CMA (Competition and Markets Authority) on the need for the deal to go through. Back in October, Microsoft confirmed to the UK CMA that Sony on it’s part has set up permanent Xbox-exclusion deals for several titles on the PlayStation.

According to Microsoft, Sony has effectively prevented games such as Final Fantasy VII Remake (FF7R), Final Fantasy XVI (FFXVI), Bloodborne, and Silent Hill 2 remaster from coming to the Xbox. The company said,

In addition to having outright exclusive content, Sony has also entered into arrangements with third-party publishers which require the “exclusion” of Xbox from the set of platforms these publishers can distribute their games on. Some prominent examples of these agreements include Final Fantasy VII Remake (Square Enix), Bloodborne (From Software), the upcoming Final Fantasy XVI (Square Enix) and the recently announced Silent Hill 2 remastered (Bloober team).”

Final Fantasy 7 Remake was originally intended to be a timed exclusive for the PS5, with the hope that it will eventually make it to the Xbox. However, this clause was apparently only intended for the PC version of the game, which is now available on Steam, and not for Xbox.

Final Fantasy XVI is launching as a PS5-exclusive on June 22, 2023. It can be assumed that the title will…