While Microsoft is currently embroilled in a series of legal issues regarding its acquisition of Activision Blizzard from regulatory bodies from around the world—namely the US FTC, the UK’s CMA, and the European Commission—the company is now also facing a lawsuit filed by gamers.
As caught by Reuters, the lawsuit, filed in California, is seeking to stop Microsoft from acquiring Activision Blizzard for similar reasons as the various regulatory bodies’ probes into the deal: to prevent the consolidation of game development in the hands of a few major companies.
According to the lawsuit, the acquisition would give Microsoft “far-outsized market power in the video game industry with the ability to foreclose rivals, limit output, reduce consumer choice, raise prices, and further inhibit competition.”
While the company has been facing a fair bit of flak for the acquisition, a Microsoft executive recently stated that PlayStation’s dominance of the console market makes the Activision Blizzard acquisition fair game for Microsoft.