Originally Posted by
SmoothPancakes
Legally, I doubt it could be called bribery. But essentially it's what it is, just probably not legally. MS is trying to essentially bribe the publishers to not show their games on the PS4 at E3. The publishers can either accept that "bribe" or not. It's no different than me trying to bribe someone I know with something like cash or beer in return for something that I want. Legally, it probably wouldn't be called bribery, but on the basic level, it's essentially what it is.
Either way, as I OU stated, it ultimately comes down to the publishers accepting the money or not. If they do, they are at a minimum at least equally as guilty as MS in the whole deal, if not more because they actually accepted the money, whereas for MS, it very well could just be business as usual and something they do regularly in all areas that they operate.