Xbox CEO just gives up

[Rozalia1]

7 hours ago, dimonemt said:

Say what now?

I can't predict whether or not the ABK deal will go through eventually, but the recent UK's CMA decision made me scratch my head a lot. The merger was blocked on the grounds that Microsoft would have an unfair advantage in cloud gaming? Lol, what? I can't even tell how dumb this is. Who even plays like that? People who like to enjoy their games on consoles on a big tv screen, and with descent  sound system will ALWAYS prefer local play over cloud gaming. That's the reason why PlayStation Now streaming service failed the way it did. I think Microsoft will have this ruling overturned on appeal because it's just bonkers.

 

Responding to something that no longer has relevance as the EU passed it, and was always likely to do so anyway as the EU's new system of regulation is even more corrupt than what it was previously.

 

The angle of the new type of regulation, which is actually a return to an old form, is that regulation needs to protect new markets from being dominated by massive companies like Microsoft early. By the time current regulation might get involved it will already be too late as the big company will have a monopoly and have already destroyed much of the competition who could never really compete anyway. You might think Cloud will never take off big, and I would hope the same, but if it does then Microsoft having this edge from this is only bad as they're already a big enough problem in the space due to the many advantages they have over others, stemming from their many previous monopolies ultimately it can't be forgotten. 

 

Microsoft complains that they're being blocked on these grounds, that Cloud is small and will always be, but they're just lying as they don't believe that. Microsoft has championed the Cloud for over a decade now. They've downplayed Sony/Nintendo as nobodies because with Cloud being the future it means they're finished when that switch happens as Microsoft is already too powerful for them. They're constantly expanding their Cloud services as a whole. They've put 69 billion into this deal which you can say isn't all cloud related, but certainly a good part. Microsoft certainly believes in cloud gaming and see it as their way to win in the end, they just got to stick it out and bleed a lot of money until the day comes. Microsoft can of course be wrong, but the fact is they believe in Cloud gaming, and so in case they're correct they should be blocked.

[Oberlin1694]

On 27/05/2023 at 5:13 AM, dimonemt said:

Say what now?

I can't predict whether or not the ABK deal will go through eventually, but the recent UK's CMA decision made me scratch my head a lot. The merger was blocked on the grounds that Microsoft would have an unfair advantage in cloud gaming? Lol, what? I can't even tell how dumb this is. Who even plays like that? People who like to enjoy their games on consoles on a big tv screen, and with descent  sound system will ALWAYS prefer local play over cloud gaming. That's the reason why PlayStation Now streaming service failed the way it did. I think Microsoft will have this ruling overturned on appeal because it's just bonkers.

Dumb or not in their reasoning the CMA seems to be the only governing board that seems to be even slightly aware of what Microsoft is attempting to do with this merger. They may need to come up with better reasons to reject the deal but they’re well aware Microsoft is going to use this deal to set art blocking off access to major games to PlayStation and Seitch to try and FORCE consumers to buy their failing console.

 

The merger needs to be blocked, even if the reasons given when doing so are a crock of shite. This merger is nothing but bad news if it is eventually pushed through. There’s no real positives for the gaming community as a whole and it will begin Microsoft’s attempted monopoly within the videogame field. The CMA seems to be well aware this is what will happen, and the FTC need to block this now as too many places are accepting the deal and it’s nothing but bad, bad, bad news.

 

Microsoft can’t be trusted on a single thing they say. None of it. They’re slimy, snaky, deceptive liars. They proved this with Bethesda, they outright cancelled Redfall on PS5 to make it an Xbox exclusive and the game was originally being developed on PS5, to then be ported, hence why it’s such a mess. They then made games which had always been multiplatform, Xbox/PC exclusive despite saying they wouldn’t do this.

 

Nobody seems to want to pull Microsoft up on all of their lies and deceit and the way they handled the Bethesda merger, yet it’s a sign of what’s to come if they do get Activision-Blizzard, everything they’ve said? About multiplatform deals etc? They’ll immediately backpedal on them and make CoD, Overwatch, Diablo etc. Xbox/PC exclusive and pay whatever the fines are in regards to this.

 

This is why the deal needs to be blocked, because neither of the parties involved can be trusted.

 

Sony isn’t exactly squeaky clean but they’ve never pulled such disgusting shit as Microsoft has with Bethesda and will attempt to with Activision-Blizzard. 

On 27/05/2023 at 5:13 AM, dimonemt said:

Say what now?

I can't predict whether or not the ABK deal will go through eventually, but the recent UK's CMA decision made me scratch my head a lot. The merger was blocked on the grounds that Microsoft would have an unfair advantage in cloud gaming? Lol, what? I can't even tell how dumb this is. Who even plays like that? People who like to enjoy their games on consoles on a big tv screen, and with descent  sound system will ALWAYS prefer local play over cloud gaming. That's the reason why PlayStation Now streaming service failed the way it did. I think Microsoft will have this ruling overturned on appeal because it's just bonkers.

 

Edited May 28, 2023 by Oberlin1694
Error in post

[dimonemt]

11 hours ago, Oberlin1694 said:

There’s no real positives for the gaming community as a whole

Bobby Kotick being gone from Activision is a positive, isn't it?

 

11 hours ago, Oberlin1694 said:

They’ll immediately backpedal on them and make CoD, Overwatch, Diablo etc. Xbox/PC exclusive

I don't see any indication that they will, after all Deathloop and Ghostwire Tokio PlayStation exclusivity deals were honored, and Mojang just released Minecraft Legends on PS5.

 

Anyhow it will be interesting to watch this process unfold.

 

 

Edited May 29, 2023 by dimonemt

[AJ_-_808]

1 minute ago, dimonemt said:

Bobby Kotick being gone from Activision is a positive isn't it?

 

I don't see any indication that they will, after all Deathloop and Ghostwire Tokio PlayStation exclusivity deals were honored, and Mojang, just released Minecraft Legends on PS5.

 

Why do you expect MS to remove Kotick?  

 

Fair chance they had to honor deathloop & ghostwire, possibly even as a requirement for the acquisition.  Also, could've simply cost more than it was worth to cancel the already inked agreement.  It is funny though, that they like to promote that they released deathloop and ghostwire (2 games already well into development and likely had contractual obligations), as if they were responsible for development from day 1.

 

On the flip side, they canceled Redfall and Starfield, which were also both in development for PS.  They also flatout lied about Skyrim and (most likely) Fallout. 

 

As for minecraft, that'd probably be as big of an uproar as cod if/when it eventually happens.

 

[dimonemt]

6 minutes ago, AJ_-_808 said:

Why do you expect MS to remove Kotick?

 

I don't think they will keep him. Not after his attitude and practices towards employees became public knowledge.

https://www.polygon.com/22889580/microsoft-activision-blizzard-acquisition-bobby-kotick

 

Bethesda did have an exclusivity agreements for Deathloop and Ghostwire, but not for Starfield and Redfall, and it is understandable that as their new owner MS directed Bethesda to stop the development for a rival platform. I think Jim Ryan would have done the same if he was in Phil Spencer's shoes here. My point is that if ABK deal eventually goes through, and Microsoft and Sony will have an agreement to bring Call of Duty and other existing IP's to PlayStation for a number of years, we can expect Microsoft to honor it. For any new IP's from ABK it's a different story, they would likely be on Xbox\PC.

[dimonemt]

Another interesting thing is the fact that Sony and Microsoft made deals with each other before.

 

https://www.sony.com/en/SonyInfo/News/Press/202005/20-0519E/

[AJ_-_808]

4 hours ago, dimonemt said:

 

Bethesda did have an exclusivity agreements for Deathloop and Ghostwire, but not for Starfield and Redfall, and it is understandable that as their new owner MS directed Bethesda to stop the development for a rival platform.

 

Not after initially saying they weren't interested in "taking games away"

 

 

4 hours ago, dimonemt said:

 

My point is that if ABK deal eventually goes through, and Microsoft and Sony will have an agreement to bring Call of Duty and other existing IP's to PlayStation for a number of years, we can expect Microsoft to honor it.

How easy do you think it'd be to extend the release cycle from every year to every 3-5 years?  Deal doesn't look so nice now if you go from an expectation of 10ish games to 2-3 during that 10 years.  MS can bleed out those so called deals easily.

 

What if they simply rename it as a "new franchise"?  I'm betting there are other ways around said deals.

 

 

As far as Kotick.. even if MS gets rid of him, they're giving him an almost $300m payday.  Good grief

 

Alternatively, ACTI board can vote him out if the deal fails 

4 hours ago, dimonemt said:

Another interesting thing is the fact that Sony and Microsoft made deals with each other before.

 

https://www.sony.com/en/SonyInfo/News/Press/202005/20-0519E/

Sony also made a deal to use MS Azure.  That was all before this.  Who knows what happens next

[Rozalia1]

9 hours ago, dimonemt said:

 

I don't think they will keep him. Not after his attitude and practices towards employees became public knowledge.

https://www.polygon.com/22889580/microsoft-activision-blizzard-acquisition-bobby-kotick

 

Bethesda did have an exclusivity agreements for Deathloop and Ghostwire, but not for Starfield and Redfall, and it is understandable that as their new owner MS directed Bethesda to stop the development for a rival platform. I think Jim Ryan would have done the same if he was in Phil Spencer's shoes here. My point is that if ABK deal eventually goes through, and Microsoft and Sony will have an agreement to bring Call of Duty and other existing IP's to PlayStation for a number of years, we can expect Microsoft to honor it. For any new IP's from ABK it's a different story, they would likely be on Xbox\PC.

 

A year ago you might've been right, but I don't see it right now. The scandal has died down and he has been accepted back into polite society. Him race baiting on TV didn't even get any push back. Microsoft has a history of protecting "talented jerks" as Nadella calls them and Kotick is considered to be talented so... plus we can't forget that Microsoft wants to be hands off and let current management of whoever they buy continue. Speaking of, that is another issue itself. Even if Kotick does, all of his stooges certainly won't so what problem exactly gets fixed?

 

Breaking those contracts would have been negatives and would have ruined their at the time intact PR efforts, which on the note of those contracts help is they allow Microsoft to parade themselves around like they're such good guys for not breaking a contract and being naturally punished for it.

 

Would he have done? Logically it makes sense, but there is no evidence of that. Have Sony/Nintendo done that even in a single case over all these decades? Most companies get invested in and then bought when they're making exclusives so there is never a need to cancel multiplatform games with them. Psygnosis which we've never heard more about due to this deal including when they actually existed didn't have their multiplatform games cancelled and in fact continued to make them for many years afterwards. Bungie who got recently bought just announced their next game and it is on Xbox. From what I can see Microsoft is the only one who plays keep away in that way.

 

9 hours ago, dimonemt said:

I don't see any indication that they will, after all Deathloop and Ghostwire Tokio PlayStation exclusivity deals were honored, and Mojang just released Minecraft Legends on PS5.

 

Anyhow it will be interesting to watch this process unfold.

 

*Paid shill's tweet*

 

There is speculation that Minecraft's expansions (whatever you'd call them) is on PlayStation as a result of it being a condition of the purchase. That would fit what Majang's management at the time would have wanted and the move is so against type for Microsoft that it just looks strange if they weren't forced into it. Though you know... that deal was in 2014 and Microsoft as we know love their 10 year deals... what if such a clause was 10 years? That would be very funny. Anyway, if that element is secret then we wouldn't know. Microsoft has the details locked away and anyone that would know is NDA'ed up. Unlike Sony/others who'll come out and say it immediately as they did with Bungie, Microsoft hiding it fits their MO. It is useful for their PR that people believe that Microsoft is being "nice" and keeping Minecraft on PlayStation. The fact that Microsoft's agents endlessly repeat it when the matter comes up only supports it to me.

 

Speaking of. The argument goes that Minecraft is unique due to the mass appeal and that is why it is not exclusive. Redfall that would not apply to and it is also a new IP. Cool, but then explain Elder Scrolls or even Starfield. Skyrim was a game whose success in good part was because it was ported to absolutely everything it could be ported to. So why is Elder Scrolls been made exclusive? Starfield might be a new IP also, but I think even their developers have said it is Skyrim in space.

 

As for the paid shill you posted the tweet of. https://forum.psnprofiles.com/topic/120951-microsoft-is-buying-activision-blizzard-for-687-billion-ftc-sues-to-stop-cma-issues-updated-preliminary-findings/?page=42

 

He has been caught out even further as a paid shill astroturfing for Microsoft. In no way is he a reasonable source of information for anyone to listen to. Reasonable people trying to be a public authority like he is don't come out and say that the day that CMA blocked the deal is a "dark day that live in infamy" like it was Pearl Harbour. His argument in those tweets is nonsense also by the way. Guys for Xbox but at least possessing some reason have already said that some of the grounds Microsoft have listed aren't good ones, and yet Florian states they're all good, which includes grounds that can be instantly dismissed because of Microsoft's own actions during the deal which had nothing to do with the CMA.

 

9 hours ago, dimonemt said:

Another interesting thing is the fact that Sony and Microsoft made deals with each other before.

 

https://www.sony.com/en/SonyInfo/News/Press/202005/20-0519E/

 

 

I thought you'd be referring to the thing that @AJ_-_808 mentioned, which as far as I know didn't go ahead. Sony "explored it" and reportedly went with Amazon.

 

As for what you've linked. No surprise to me. Japanese companies function differently than western ones in that they're more "siloed", with parts of a company often not coordinating together well and when if it gets real bad, sabotaging each other. Kaz Hirai I recall reading did reduce that at Sony when Sony was doing real bad but it still exists to an extent. 

 

You can see this in gaming with mobile games which actually aren't under PlayStation, but instead Sony Music. A fact that likely has delayed PlayStation attempting to expand into mobile gaming which if you believe Microsoft's arguments during this deal, is a key place to expand to. Not that Sony Music hasn't been doing stuff in mobile, but PlayStation would likely be more aggressive. There are other properties other parts of Sony also own that PlayStation could make real use of that they don't, but to be fair recently we have seen PlayStation getting to use its properties for TV shows and the like which have been successful and are a result of being aided by the other parts of the company.

 

Microsoft itself knows all of this hence why they have no issue working with another element of Sony. PlayStation is the part of Sony that they scorn.

[dimonemt]

6 hours ago, AJ_-_808 said:

Not after initially saying they weren't interested in "taking games away"

 

I'm thinking games that were already on the market or those with contractual obligations.

6 hours ago, AJ_-_808 said:

What if they simply rename it as a "new franchise"?  I'm betting there are other ways around said deals.

 

Sony's lawyers better include all necessary language in the contract in order to prevent that from happening, otherwise they are not worth the money that Sony pays them.

6 hours ago, AJ_-_808 said:

As far as Kotick.. even if MS gets rid of him, they're giving him an almost $300m payday.  Good grief

Alternatively, ACTI board can vote him out if the deal fails 

 

Yeah, that's the unfortunate reality of a corporate takeovers like this. The CEO's will always end up with a golden parachutes.

Activision's board reportedly has a lot of Koticks buddies in it, who have exonerated him already from all wrongdoing in the company, so i would not bet on them to do the right thing here.

 

1 hour ago, Rozalia1 said:

So why is Elder Scrolls been made exclusive?

Future Elder Scrolls games, not the games that are already on the market, after all the Elder Scrolls online and Fallout 76 and their expansions are still available on all platforms they were released on. As for the upcoming games, new bosses make new rules. And it makes sense from a business perspective to limit an upcoming release of an anticipated game to your own platform. Unless the other party wants to have a deal with you(Call of Duty). Things like that happened in gaming industry before. Bayonetta is a great example, the first game was multiplatform, and then Nintendo got the publishing rights for it and made subsequent  games exclusive to their platform. Don't get me wrong here: this sucks, but there is nothing we can do about it.

 

1 hour ago, Rozalia1 said:

He has been caught out even further as a paid shill astroturfing for Microsoft.

 

Don't know the guy, but his math makes sense here.

[Rozalia1]

1 minute ago, dimonemt said:

Future Elder Scrolls games, not the games that are already on the market, after all the Elder Scrolls online and Fallout 76 and their expansions are still available on all platforms they were released on. As for the upcoming games, new bosses make new rules. And it makes sense from a business perspective to limit an upcoming release of an anticipated game to your own platform. Unless the other party wants to have a deal with you(Call of Duty). Things like that happened in gaming industry before. Bayonetta is a great example, the first game was multiplatform, and then Nintendo got the publishing rights for it and made subsequent  games exclusive to their platform. Don't get me wrong here: this sucks, but there is nothing we can do about it.

 

 

Don't know the guy, but his math makes sense here.

 

Delisting those games already out only hurts them, most importantly to them in their PR, so it is not even worth mentioning. As I stated before and I will say again. The explanation people give for Minecraft applies to the Elder Scroll games too so why aren't they also on PlayStation too? As I said, Minecraft likely is on PlayStation because of it being a condition of the buyout.

 

You talk as if Sony initiated talk regarding Call of Duty. Microsoft offered them 3 years after feeling there was some possible issues (and for PR) and then upped that to 10 years, though I recall a short period where it became 5 years... that was Microsoft putting that forward. Same for all the other companies. They went to them, not the other way around. None of those deals included the rest of Activision's games, though the EU when they accepted the deal included them too, at least for Cloud gaming. Note that many of these deals were nonsense anyway. Boosteroid for example already had Call of Duty on their service, so Microsoft's deal with them gave them all of 0. Boosteroid also changed their location from Romania to Ukraine right before their deal with Microsoft so Microsoft could claim to be "helping Ukraine" (note, Microsoft is currently doing business in Russia) which only makes them even more suspicious.

 

Bayonetta 2? Nintendo funded the game. If Bayonetta 4 wants to be multiplatform nothing stops it being so. That is not the same as what Microsoft has done no.

 

 

Well now you know that the guy is bought and paid for by Microsoft, and if his astroturfing accounts and that court case from way back are anything to go by has been for a decade+. Yet you still think there is some worth in his words? His maths is probability nonsense. Each decision on the grounds the CAT will be making will be done individually, not as a whole with each following decision having no relation to the previous. With this nonsense he gives the CMA single digit chances of succeeding when the reality is that Microsoft is actually the one who has single digit chances.

 

The CMA also by the way came out with a statement recently that they are prepared to fight this appeal, and they believe the deal should be blocked. If they hold to that even if the CAT appeal succeeds, nothing stops them just continuing to block.

[dimonemt]

28 minutes ago, Rozalia1 said:

Each decision on the grounds the CAT will be making will be done individually, not as a whole with each following decision having no relation to the previous.

 

So the guy argues that Microsoft has 12 grounds for an appeal and victory on a single ground means that block will be quashed. Therefore CMA chance of success is single digits. You are saying that it's not like that, and there will be a single verdict regardless of how many grounds there is, correct?

[NxtDoc]

I don't believe it.  Them buying up tons of Studios in PlayGround, Ninja Theory, Undead Labs, Double Fine, Obsidian, inExile, all of Zenimax which included Bethesda with BIG (undeniable?) IP in Fallout, Elder Scrolls, Doom, and Wolfenstein.  And making a move on ABK!  

 

It's all smoke and mirrors. Phil is saying one thing publicly.  But Microsoft is competing, and only showing more aggression by out spending.  Microsoft is doing what they do best.  When they can't "win", they buy everything up until their target can no longer compete, and they "win" by having more expendable money.  They tried to buy Nintendo when this all started!

 

Make no mistake.  They are attacking PlayStation (as it's always been about stopping PS) in their "weakest" areas.  Money (compared to MS), and Cloud.  MS believes if they can reshape the gaming market expectations, and set a different trend in areas Sony is weakest they can take over.  It's very plausible.  All 3 have set some bad trends in gaming.  But MS has set several negative gaming trends, being the least desirable platform.  

 

Gaming fans should be concerned.  As MS wants all control over the products they distribute.

[Rozalia1]

21 minutes ago, dimonemt said:

So the guy argues that Microsoft has 12 grounds for an appeal and victory on a single ground means that block will be quashed. Therefore CMA chance of success is single digits. You are saying that it's not like that, and there will be a single verdict regardless of how many grounds there is, correct?

 

What I'm saying is that each decision is individual and has nothing to do with the previous. He lists the CMA having 80% to win on each decision, something he thinks is too high but he is being "generous" on this, which means that Microsoft has a 20% chance on each attempt. That means once you factor everything in it means that Microsoft has a 93+% chance of winning according to him. Their chance of passing, going by his numbers, is 20% on each count. He does this so he can turn around the claims of Microsoft having a low chance of success into them instead having overwhelming odds of victory.

 

The reality is not only is 80% generous in the opposite direction that Florian is noting if you're putting %s to these things, but many of these grounds are straight up bunk and have no chance of success at all. When I reviewed the grounds in the other thread I saw 1 out of all of that which I believed might have a case. Granted, what we've seen is a summary and Microsoft has a massive army of lawyers to attempt to twist any little thing, but Florian's talk of them having 12 solid grounds is bunkum. For some examples take the grounds of CMA's Cloud numbers being off that has been spread around a bunch so people can claim the CMA is incompetent. Microsoft refused to show the CMA their numbers. Furthermore when Microsoft took issue with the CMA's numbers which caused the CMA to drop the console SLC, they took zero issue with the numbers listed for Cloud gaming and only now have an issue. Even now there has been no indication that Microsoft will provide the numbers, instead it seems likely they will try that argument that was going round that as you can now play Fortnite on Amazon Prime that Luna should include all of Prime's subscribers too (ignore that you can play Fortnite on xCloud with a free Microsoft account). Then you have the matter of Cloud gaming not being a market, just a distribution method. Microsoft has already accepted the EU's decision which sees the Cloud as a separate market, no problem wit them doing that, but it is one if the CMA does it?

 

You'd think Microsoft would be more competent on this, but being dishonest and arrogant is not a good combo. Many of the problems they've ran into here may well never have happened if Microsoft, embarrassed at being beaten so soundly by Sony, didn't start boasting that Sony/Nintendo aren't even competition to them, Cloud gaming is where it'll be at soon and so Google/Amazon are their actual competition. After that they can't now turn around and say that obviously they were lying and Cloud gaming sucks so please pass the deal so we can "compete".

 

6 minutes ago, NxtDoc said:

I don't believe it.  Them buying up tons of Studios in PlayGround, Ninja Theory, Undead Labs, Double Fine, Obsidian, inExile, all of Zenimax which included Bethesda with BIG (undeniable?) IP in Fallout, Elder Scrolls, Doom, and Wolfenstein.  And making a move on ABK!  

 

It's all smoke and mirrors. Phil is saying one thing publicly.  But Microsoft is competing, and only showing more aggression by out spending.  Microsoft is doing what they do best.  When they can't "win", they buy everything up until their target can no longer compete, and they "win" by having more expendable money.  They tried to buy Nintendo when this all started!

 

Make no mistake.  They are attacking PlayStation (as it's always been about stopping PS) in their "weakest" areas.  Money (compared to MS), and Cloud.  MS believes if they can reshape the gaming market expectations, and set a different trend in areas Sony is weakest they can take over.  It's very plausible.  All 3 have set some bad trends in gaming.  But MS has set several negative gaming trends, being the least desirable platform.  

 

Gaming fans should be concerned.  As MS wants all control over the products they distribute.

 

It is a credit to how well Microsoft's PR machine used to work that so many didn't turn on Spencer when before the Bethesda deal he was saying it wasn't about taking away games, then once he went through he started saying that obviously the deal was about exclusive games for Xbox.

 

I'm in agreement with you. Microsoft, the tasteless company that it is, is trying to take out PlayStation with sheer financial might and also take gaming over as a whole by moving it to Subscription/Cloud gaming where they intend to establish a monopoly. Thankfully their efforts seem to be failing and their gaming business keeps falling apart, heck, imagine how bad the numbers would be right now if they didn't keep buying companies to add their revenue to Xbox. Of course if we ever see Xbox's full numbers that'll be the day they'll start getting shuttered.

[NxtDoc]

24 minutes ago, Rozalia1 said:

It is a credit to how well Microsoft's PR machine used to work that so many didn't turn on Spencer when before the Bethesda deal he was saying it wasn't about taking away games, then once he went through he started saying that obviously the deal was about exclusive games for Xbox.

 

I'm in agreement with you. Microsoft, the tasteless company that it is, is trying to take out PlayStation with sheer financial might and also take gaming over as a whole by moving it to Subscription/Cloud gaming where they intend to establish a monopoly. Thankfully their efforts seem to be failing and their gaming business keeps falling apart, heck, imagine how bad the numbers would be right now if they didn't keep buying companies to add their revenue to Xbox. Of course if we ever see Xbox's full numbers that'll be the day they'll start getting shuttered.

 

It's definitely is.  And I'm absolutely in agreement about MS making a (IMO Shitty) Sub Service and Cloud based gaming platform.  As we have heard many times now from Phil's mouth.  These games will be available only "where gamepASS exists".  So that says right there, they want gamepASS everywhere.  And for Xbox to he the defacto gaming subscription "service". 

 

And how do they achieve that?  You already have an idea if this Im sure.  Gaming is adjusting to new technologies that (unfortunately?) fall under Microsofts "strengths".  So to get ahead (which as you know they tried initially in 2013 "Power of the Cloud") of everyone else.  1st to market and all that.  They want to also gather up as much undeniable IP as they can, bought Zenimax, now Acti-Blizz-King.  Make their games exclusive, slap those games in gamepASS, and "gamepASS exclusive" is then coined.  Yay

[Rozalia1]

1 hour ago, NxtDoc said:

It's definitely is.  And I'm absolutely in agreement about MS making a (IMO Shitty) Sub Service and Cloud based gaming platform.  As we have heard many times now from Phil's mouth.  These games will be available only "where gamepASS exists".  So that says right there, they want gamepASS everywhere.  And for Xbox to he the defacto gaming subscription "service". 

 

And how do they achieve that?  You already have an idea if this Im sure.  Gaming is adjusting to new technologies that (unfortunately?) fall under Microsofts "strengths".  So to get ahead (which as you know they tried initially in 2013 "Power of the Cloud") of everyone else.  1st to market and all that.  They want to also gather up as much undeniable IP as they can, bought Zenimax, now Acti-Blizz-King.  Make their games exclusive, slap those games in gamepASS, and "gamepASS exclusive" is then coined.  Yay

 

You've got it. If gaming will go to subscriptions/cloud we'll see (hopefully not), but Microsoft is certainly trying hard to force the issue. They want to devalue gaming like music and other things got devalued, to make people look at buying things as a waste. Why do that when you can get on gamepass, "best value in gaming", we have been told repeatedly in the gaming media, by their astroturfers, and what fans Xbox has left. We also get told that Sony/Nintendo could easily compete with Microsoft if they too put all their games day 1 on a subscription service. The problem of course is that subscription/cloud is currently a big money loser, and not just in gaming as we've been seeing companies retreating from going fully into subscription/streaming in the movie industry. Microsoft can of course bleed all that money no problem, after all the Xbox has done nothing but bleed them money already. Sony and Nintendo on the other hand can't afford to take repeated massive losses like Microsoft can.

 

If they get their way gaming will only become worse. The whole "cheap" aspect will quickly go as they'll be able to increase the price steadily. Quality will suffer as games will have to be built with being on a subscription in mind, with Microsoft being able to choose who lives and who dies because in a world where buying games is devalued anyone who is not on the service will not be able to survive. Even the aspect of Microsoft currently benefitting Indies (not all as we've found out) by giving them big guaranteed money will disappear, because once Microsoft has changed the market to what they want they can heavily decrease payments to smaller developers and they'll have no choice but to accept.

[AJ_-_808]

4 hours ago, dimonemt said:

 

Bayonetta is a great example, the first game was multiplatform, and then Nintendo got the publishing rights for it and made subsequent  games exclusive to their platform. Don't get me wrong here: this sucks, but there is nothing we can do about 

 

Bayonetta is a terrible comparison.  Bayonetta doesn't have the fanbase, sheer size, or many years being multiplatform (Fallout and Elder Scrolls have titles going back to ps3, as do Doom & Wolfenstein - don't be surprised if they're next for exclusive announcements btw)

[dimonemt]

2 hours ago, AJ_-_808 said:

Bayonetta doesn't have the fanbase, sheer size, or many years being multiplatform

 

All of this is irrelevant here when new owner comes in and establishes new rules. No, it is exactly the same. Bayonetta is great fun, and i wish i could play 2 and 3 on PlayStation, but Nintendo had other thoughts. As for new Doom, Wolfenstein etc. i expect them to be Xbox/PC exclusive because you don't spend billions of dollars on a company and make games coming from them available on a rival platform. Insomniac studios for example made Fuse and Sunset Overdrive, the latter being an Xbox exclusive, but now they have a new owner, and being PlayStation first party studio it's silly to expect them to release any game outside of Sony's platform, the same is true for Bethesda.

Edited May 30, 2023 by dimonemt

[AJ_-_808]

6 minutes ago, dimonemt said:

 

All of this is irrelevant here when new owner comes in and establishes new rules. No, it is exactly the same. Bayonetta is great fun, and i wish i could play 2 and 3 on PlayStation, but Nintendo had other thoughts. As for new Doom, Wolfenstein etc. i expect them to be Xbox/PC exclusive because you don't spend billions of dollars on a company and make games coming from them available on a rival platform. Insomniac studios for example made Fuse and Sunset Overdrive, the latter being an Xbox exclusive, but now they have a new owner, and being PlayStation first party studio it's silly to expect them to release any game outside of Sony's platform, the same is true for Bethesda.

It's not irrelevant.  It's comparing apples and oranges.

 

They're both video games, but one (or several rather) have a long history of being multiplatform while the other doesn't.

 

And Insomniac also isn't a good comparison to Bethesda (Zenimax).  Firstly, Insomniac is a single studio, Bethesda is a publisher with 6 studios in it's wheelhouse.

 

Insomniac has games going back to 1996 with PlayStation 1.  Out of 27 console games, 2 are shared with Xbox and 1 is exclusive to Xbox.  When 90% of the studio's games are made for Sony, a Sony buyout doesn't hurt Xbox in the least (can't lose what you never had)

 

Zenimax console games don't go back as far as Insomniac, but nearly all of them are PlayStation/Xbox multi platform, until recently.

 

Just because MS bought them out under the radar doesn't mean it should've been allowed, and their behavior with said IPs since then is part of the reason they're getting pushback now.  Just because Xbox can throw around daddy MS's infinite money, doesn't mean it should be allowed.

 

A better comparison would be if Sony bought out EA or Take Two and made their various, historically multiplatform  IP's exclusive.  It wouldn't be right either.

[miickomadyoke_-]

xbox is a mess 

[Z1MZUM]

4 hours ago, miickomadyoke_- said:

xbox is a mess 

 

XBSX is a serious console, then again I wouldn't lose sleep if we lost it or the Playstation. We always have PC where the owner rules anyway and Nintendo can go and EAD, I have a switch and still emulate more then using the actual switch.

[Rozalia1]

53 minutes ago, Z1MZUM said:

XBSX is a serious console, then again I wouldn't lose sleep if we lost it or the Playstation. We always have PC where the owner rules anyway and Nintendo can go and EAD, I have a switch and still emulate more then using the actual switch.

 

I would disagree and rate the XBSX badly. It gets outperformed by the PS5 often enough even if it ain't by much... all while being 200 bucks more expensive to produce out of Microsoft's own chicken lips. Being that much more expensive it should easily and noticeably outperform the PS5, not have comparable performance. Of course getting that level of performance at less cost would require Microsoft to actually innovate and design a console well which isn't part of Microsoft/Xbox's culture.

 

To be fair, every Xbox except for the 360 has been a mess in the production cost respect... which as a consequence had the RROD issue which made Microsoft lose a fortune as a result anyway. I think XBSX might be the worse one yet however. Xbox One was noticeably weaker and more expensive than the PS4 yes, but a good chunk of that extra cost was the Kinect.

[Oberlin1694]

1 hour ago, Z1MZUM said:

 

XBSX is a serious console, then again I wouldn't lose sleep if we lost it or the Playstation. We always have PC where the owner rules anyway and Nintendo can go and EAD, I have a switch and still emulate more then using the actual switch.

I’d argue otherwise. Their output in terms of games is frankly appalling and dare I say, even embarrassing. It’s trailing massively behind PlayStation 5, which is why Microsoft is so desperate to make these shitty deals to begin with.

 

The exclusives Sony gets is usually with major Asian studios; From, Square, Konami, Capcom, Sega etc. as those studio’s are unlikely to gamble with Xbox exclusivity due to the games generally flopping there. Says it all really.

 

If the ABK deal does go through Sony needs to start cashing in the loyalty they have from some of these studio’s and get them on-board. I don’t think Square Enix, Konami, Sega, Atlus etc. would take much convincing from Sony to NEVER release another game to Xbox. And then what do they have? A Bethesda game every few years?

 

Microsoft may look like they’re onto a ‘winner’ here, but really they’re just on a collision course where they’ll end up burning a lot of bridges as a lot of Asian studios flat out dislike the Xbox 

[Dark_Overlord]

10 hours ago, dimonemt said:

 

All of this is irrelevant here when new owner comes in and establishes new rules. No, it is exactly the same. Bayonetta is great fun, and i wish i could play 2 and 3 on PlayStation, but Nintendo had other thoughts. As for new Doom, Wolfenstein etc. i expect them to be Xbox/PC exclusive because you don't spend billions of dollars on a company and make games coming from them available on a rival platform. Insomniac studios for example made Fuse and Sunset Overdrive, the latter being an Xbox exclusive, but now they have a new owner, and being PlayStation first party studio it's silly to expect them to release any game outside of Sony's platform, the same is true for Bethesda.

 

Bayonetta is a bad example.  Sega shelved it, neither MS nor Sony were interested in funding it, but Nintendo was.  If not for Nintendo, there wouldn't of been a Bayonetta 2 or 3.

[miickomadyoke_-]

6 hours ago, Rozalia1 said:

 

I would disagree and rate the XBSX badly. It gets outperformed by the PS5 often enough even if it ain't by much... all while being 200 bucks more expensive to produce out of Microsoft's own chicken lips. Being that much more expensive it should easily and noticeably outperform the PS5, not have comparable performance. Of course getting that level of performance at less cost would require Microsoft to actually innovate and design a console well which isn't part of Microsoft/Xbox's culture.

 

To be fair, every Xbox except for the 360 has been a mess in the production cost respect... which as a consequence had the RROD issue which made Microsoft lose a fortune as a result anyway. I think XBSX might be the worse one yet however. Xbox One was noticeably weaker and more expensive than the PS4 yes, but a good chunk of that extra cost was the Kinect.

i agree the one thing i never understand is they dont try exclusives, Sony have proven what a good single player exclusive can do for sales/popularity its like xbox dont care or they haven't got the interest in doing it. the last one i can think of that was even a small attempt was sunset overdive on the xbox one in 2013 and that was mediocre in comparison to infamous second son at the time. Also the trophy system is miles better than achievments

[Speling_Expirt]

It's actually a shame that Xbox is in this mess.

 

I hope they can sort themselves out soon.