Phil Spencer Congratulates Obsidian's Grounded Team On 'Full Release'

“Really proud of you obsidian… just not enough to spend any marketing money on your game”

@Kaloudz yeah they most definitely see things like that. And they can get away with it with windows as it comes preinstalled on the vast majority of pcs…but gamepass…you have to wonder what the logic is there for only promoting gamepass games within gamepass…how does that get the casual gamer in who isn’t already part of gamepass and exists more in the actual world than on the internet?
The marketing issue I see as an extension to the poor management at Xbox. Xbox could buy up every publisher and still come last place because they are simply inept at managing their games and marketing them.

I do think you’re right though, once they have cod they’ll market that…but not to the extent sony has, not even to the extent they used to when they had a decent marketing team with the 360. And that will be what will end up resulting in future stories here of cod selling all time low etc…not because ‘Sony fanboys refuse to buy it’…that would make no difference. Cod is usually one of, if not the, best selling games each year…sony still market the hell out of it each and every year - promoting it on billboards, busses, train stations, cinema, tv, etc… I can’t see activision under Phil Spencer being that organised to be capable of marketing cod as effective as Sony.
It will be amazing for us already on gamepass to get cod day 1. But they have to get that message out that the alternative to get it is on gamepass day 1. I honestly can’t recall ever seeing a single advert for gamepass outside of the internet in the 5 or so years since it’s been available. I can’t recall the last time I saw an advert for an Xbox console. And can’t think of the last game I saw an ad campaign for that came from Xbox - outside of the internet.

While I am not much of a survival game person, I really like Grounded. It's such a unique take on the genre and Obsidian did such an amazing job making everything feel so believable.

I played the game when it first went into Early Access and the difference between then and now is staggering! The QoL improvements make it much more enjoyable than when I played it.

@Kaloudz People criticize the marketing, and while I don't wholly disagree, or devalue marketing (Windows beat the far superior OS/2 Warp almost entirely because of the Rolling Stones "Start Me Up" ad campaign), I also think there's a certain aspect of knowing their market and their model in play. Sony's a big media company, saturating the media with manufactured hype for a new "it thing" is the heart and soul of their playbook and experience. They manufacture demand by generating an overload of the new thing being THE new thing, and then it vanishes and they manufacture the next big thing. Movies, TV, music, fashion, trendy food, that's the standard business model and they know how to use that well.

BUT, remember that marketing is often more than half the cost of every product we buy. We pay for them generating that hype as a direct payment. People say GP is unsustainable etc, but how much pure marketing money is NOT being spent and is instead invested in the product and services themselves to become its own word of mouth marketing. By saving the marketing budget (or spending it at wisely targeted events and promos) and reducing costs (subsidized hardware, Game Pass, etc) to generate a positive customer experience, customers then act as the marketing via word of mouth/social.)

And they may well know their market, and know their market demographic isn't necessarily swayed by mass market pop culture advertising, but has a heavy internet presence and engagement with related products (including Windows/Edge) and is likely to see free/quiet marketing much more actively.

It's not always a cut and dry thing of "PS has big marketing campaigns and to compete MS must generate the same marketing hype in the same venues." It may seem that way, but they also may have a very different target demographic in mind they're trying to appeal to, and both know how to reach that demographic.

I mean it's also possible they're wholly incompetent at this marketing thing and are missing customers and public opinion left and right by forgetting to sell the product, but they may also be hyping exactly as much as they need to to the demo they're trying to hype it to. When you see people, for example, on Push, complain about how nobody on social, and the gaming media shuts up about Game Pass and Phil, etc..... It may be working very well, their strategy.

@Bleachedsmiles IDK, how many other games have the marketing of being a keynote game for 2 straight years while in beta because there are no other games out of beta to talk about?

@NEStalgia heh having it as part of a show for consecutive years isn’t exactly ‘marketing’…the message is still pretty limited to those that follow gaming. They already have us.

But I do think maybe a lot of Xbox lack of marketing outside of its own services and gaming media outlets probably does coincide with the fact they’ve had so little game wise to promote over the last god knows how many years now.
Their old marketing team have probably died of neglect. Shame, as when Xbox was outwardly hungry they produced some awesome ad campaigns that really did elevate their ip and console brand…gears of wars ‘mad world’ still sticks firmly in mind. And that whole ‘life’s short’ one was genuinely up there with 90’s PlayStation peak weirdness ads.