Microsoft has won the legal battle against the Federal Trade Committee. The FTC was attempting to get a temporary injunction to block Microsoft’s ongoing plans to purchase Activision Blizzard. The injunction was to give the FTC more time to investigate the matter, but today the court ruled in Microsoft’s favour, removing a substantial obstacle from their path.

Judge Jude Corley’s final statement was: “Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision has been described as the largest in tech history. It deserves scrutiny. That scrutiny has paid off: Microsoft has committed in writing, in public, and in court to keep Call of Duty on PlayStation for 10 years on parity with Xbox. It made an agreement with Nintendo to bring Call of Duty to Switch. And it entered several agreements to for the first time bring Activision’s content to several cloud gaming services.

“This Court’s responsibility in this case is narrow. It is to decide if, notwithstanding these current circumstances, the merger should be halted perhaps even terminated pending resolution of the FTC administrative action. For the reasons explained, the Court finds the FTC has not shown a likelihood it will prevail on its claim this particular vertical merger in this specific industry may substantially lessen competition. To the contrary, the record evidence points to more consumer access to Call of Duty and other Activision content. The motion for a preliminary injunction is therefore DENIED.”

“We’re grateful to the court for swiftly deciding in our favor,” Xbox boss Phil Spencer said on Twitter today. “The evidence showed the Activision Blizzard deal is good for the industry and the FTC’s claims about console switching, multi-game subscription services, and cloud don’t reflect the realities of the gaming market.

“Since we first announced this deal, our commitment to bringing more games to more people on more devices has only grown. We’ve signed multiple agreements to make Activision Blizzard’s games, Xbox first-party games and Game Pass all available to more players than they are today.

“We know that players around the world have been watching this case closely and I’m proud of our efforts to expand player access and choice throughout this journey.”

With the FTC out of the way, that just leaves my country’s CMA standing in Microsoft’s path. The CMA’s decision to block the acquisition of Activision Blizzard was a surprising one because it focused on concerns over the nascent Cloud gaming market. UK MPs quizzed the CMA over the decision, with many of them seeming unsure of the choice to block the deal.

It seems that the FTC losing the battle has at least somewhat altered the CMA’s stance, though. Microsoft, Activision and the CMA have agreed to a stay of litigation, stating that it would be in the “public’s best interest.” Microsoft is considering how the proposal may be altered to appease the CMA.

Whatever happens, moving forward, the legal fight between Microsoft and the FTC provided us plenty of juicy little details and insider information, such as what companies Microsoft are keeping an eye on and how Microsoft openly admitted that the Xbox had lost the console war.

It does also look like the acquisition of Activision will be happening. Though the CMA are notoriously hard to appeal against, I think all signs indicate they will change their mind, albeit while making Microsoft concede a few more things.