While several gaming companies saw profits as well as losses throughout 2024, Microsoft seems to have had the best performance in publishing titles for the year. According to VGC, a report from data firm Ampere revealed that, thanks to the sales of games like the latest Call of Duty and Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, Microsoft was the biggest game publisher across PC, PlayStation and Xbox.The report cites Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 as being one of the key contributors to this success, bringing in 38 million monthly players in November. The report also credits the fact that Microsoft has been focusing on bringing its first-party titles to platforms other than Xbox as well, with 64 percent of the Microsoft titles being bought came from PlayStation players buying Call of Duty.According to Ampere, Microsoft is followed by Electronic Arts, which made $366 million in December 2024, compared top Microsofts $465 million. EAs performance was credited to the latest entry in its early line-up of football games, EA Sports FC 25.Aside from publisher stats, Amperes report also revealed data on free-to-play titles. Fortnite took the lead in this regard, with a cumulative 30 million hours being spent in the game on Christmas. Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 also saw quite a bit of play on Christmas, with 20 million cumulative hours.Other new releases, the report cites four key titles published by Chinese companies that had large player bases in December: NetEases Marvel Rivals, the Tencent-published Path of Exile 2, Papergames Infinity Nikki, and Tencents Delta Force. Path of Exile 2 has reportedly generated $148 million through its pay-to-access Early Access release, as well as its microtransaction shop. Marvel Rivals, on the other hand, is estimated to have 29 million monthly players.The growing global scale of major Chinese publishers adds a new dynamic to the console and PC gaming markets, and inevitably means added competition in what is already a hyper-competitive industry, said Ampere research director Piers Harding-Rolls talking about the performance of these titles in December.When it comes to hardware, however, Microsoft is trailing behind quite a bit. Even the current-gen Xbox Series X/S isnt selling at the same rate as the Xbox One did, according to a recent report by Circanas Mat Piscatella. The report did indicate, however, that console sales have been on a downward trend for all companies, with 2023 having been a better year for hardware sales than 2024 was.Considering the success that Microsoft has seen as a game publisher recently, here are our thoughts on what we can expect to see from the company on the gaming front in 2025.