Last year, Xbox decided to limit the content it showed off at 2022's Summer Showcase to games that were set to release within 12 months. While the move was clearly an attempt to deliver on showing more complete titles, it didn't really pay off due to multiple delays - with projects like Starfield and Forza Motorsport shifting to later on in 2023.
Well, it's looking like Xbox may have learnt its lesson with this year's Games Showcase. According to Jez Corden of Windows Central, "Microsoft is ditching the 12-month thing for this showcase", as discussed on a recent episode of The Xbox Two podcast.
Corden did go on to say that his claim was mostly speculation - it's based on the games he's heard will be at the showcase. Basically, he suspects Microsoft is planning on showing off certain titles that are likely to be well over a year away from launching. Here's the explanation in his own words:
"I will say that there are some things slated for the Showcase which are a bit further out."
"[I'm 75% sure]. Some of the games that I've heard that are going to be at the Showcase are surely further out than 12 months. So, unless some of these games are launching sooner than expected..."
We've heard nothing on the format of the show directly from Microsoft yet - aside from the fact that the Starfield Direct livestream will take place right after the main Xbox Games Showcase concludes. It goes without saying that we should all take Corden's words as rumour for now, even if the Windows Central journalist has a decent track record all told.
During a recent interview on the Kinda Funny XCast, Xbox's Phil Spencer did reel off a bunch of upcoming games he's been checking out internally ahead of the show. The boss mentioned Starfield, Forza Motorsport, Hellblade 2, Avowed and even "collections of games", and we'd expect most of these to appear at the show in some fashion.
Which of Xbox's upcoming slate do you want to see most at next month's show? Let us know down in the comments!
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They didn't stick to it last year either 😂
Doesn’t bode well for the planned releases for the next 12 months. It seems like we’ve been teased with games that will come for years and years. We need games to start to come. The hype for Redfall now looks ridiculous. They’d be better on just delivering at this point not teasing a game 4 years away.
Responding to comments here - You can’t have a subscription model based on day one exclusives and not have exclusives. They should have a more robust pipe line of titles. A showcase should have plenty to discuss for the Next 12 months of releases. It’s a strange spin to say Xbox are doing this because of delays. He is saying - the showcase will feature games not planned for release in the next 12 months. Which would suggest sparse offerings already before delays.
They should be having 4/5 big releases planned in next 12 months. More than enough for a good showcase.
The concept is 'fine' but that adds pressure to ensure they can deliver all those within that time-frame - especially in a world where so many issues can crop up that makes it difficult, if not impossible to deliver products to the standard expected.
They could 'still' focus on games expected within the next 12 months with some maybe that are on the edge of making it within that time - but as we are not told its coming within 12 months, if it slips to 18mths+, no-one is criticising as they weren't 'expecting' it by a specific date - like E3 2024 for example as we were with Redfall, Forza and Starfield after the last E3.
The problem is more to do with setting Expectations and then 'disappointing' - they set themselves up to 'fail' with that whole 12mnths thing and put them in a difficult position to either push out game(s) before they are 'ready' or fail to deliver within 12mnths.
They could stick to their internal 12 month but just not call attention to it.
Then if they still fall short they are not accountable for anything.
Contrary to popular opinion, statistically they actually did pretty well at getting out those games announced last year. The trouble is the games that didn't make it were their tentpole titles accross each segment AAA, AA and indie like Starfield, Forza, Stalker 2, Ark 2, Replaced & Cocoon.
Still by my reckoning of the 50 games they listed on their "next 12 months on xbox" infographic 23 of 25 games listed for 2022 made it, a couple a few months late. And so far 16 of 25 have made it in the first half of 2023, with almost all coming later in 2023. That's around 80% in 12 months... and there's still a chance of a shadow drop.
Personally I think that's pretty good, considering we know games slip and it's almost always a good thing they do. But I understand it's the tentpole titles that missed the mark making it SEEM like they missed the mark more than they did.
I'd like to see a similar showcase, focusing on games they hope will arrive in the next 12 months, but without that same self imposed time limit which has been used to drag them down, along with several of the games not being the high quality we had hoped.
What I don't want to see is CGI trailers or games that are years and years away, we already have too many of those!
I don't want to see anything new from Microsoft's first party studios. Gameplay - actual gameplay with the hud - & release dates for what's been revealed over the last few years is what I wanna see, don't just keep adding stuff on top of what we're waiting for.
I’m happy with any news however far off. I just hope they try and be honest about proposed time-lines. For projects that are miles off presumably they can narrow it down to an 18month-2 year window, for games well into development you’d hope they can narrow it down to a 12 month window and for games undergoing testing, optimising and bug squishing hopefully a 3-6 month window.
Just be honest, and don’t worry about delaying something if it isn’t up to scratch (mentioning no names…)
@themightyant I don’t what consists of all the games you listed but I imagine the vast majority of them are smaller games that would have far less likelihood of being delayed.
You accurately commented that they didn’t have any “big” games in the timeframe which I think is probably part of the issue. Additionally, on the interview with Phil, he said they didn’t get the job done regarding the 12 month thing so there is that.
What is the point of this then? They could literally show a bunch of cgi trailers for games that won't come out for the next 5 years.
The truth is that these are just hour long commercials for consoles so they include stuff that we won't see for years and years just to build fake hype. If they actually stuck to "next 12 months" then we'd only see like 5 games, out of which 2 would be worth playing and the other 3 would be mediocre.
I don’t think they need to make a “12 month” declaration, but I do think they should not announce games so far in advance. They look ridiculous now after announcing Hellblade 2 in 2019 and State of Decay 3, Fable, Forza Motorsport 8, Perfect Dark, and Avowed back in 2020. 3-4 years later and we’ve barely seen any footage of these outside of Forza and Hellblade. I remember when they announced them and there were rumors that a lot of these wouldn’t be out until 2022 or 2023 and everyone thought that was crazy that they would be that far away.
Rather than a hard 12 month window, it would be better to simply give the year of expected release. This would give them more like 18 months as a window. Avowed and Hellblade 2 should be 2024 titles at this point, among several others.
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I get why MS did it but end of the day it relies on games not being delayed. That said i would rather that then announcing games that are years away.
Gee golly can't wait to see games that are going to he teased at several E3s before we get to play it.
Seriously though i get that hitting release dates is almost impossible but we can't go back to MS using E3 to promise games years and years down the line. I'd rather they just showed the next X releases instead.
I think Xbox this generation will have damaged any good faith with long time Xbox fans and I can see a lot jumping ship next gen or even midway through this one.
Even if they have games tied to Xbox which is what Phil Spencer’s said PlayStation users won’t do
But I can definitely see Xbox users doing this.
They have promised and failed to many times.
Consoles are expensive and people buy them on promises of good quality games.
At the moment all we have really are third party releases to look foward to which people can play on PlayStation plus there exclusives which people May Day there single player cookie cutter games but at least they release in good shape and a consistent quality.
Phil spencer has managed to lose alot of peoples faith in the brand.
Seeing Xbox congratulation Nintendo on totk when Xbox can’t seem to release a decent game day one and constant push backs is just a slap in the face to loyal fans.
Hopefully Xbox can turn this around but buy the time these games are released we will probably be at the end of this gen or towards the end.
There’s nothing on Xbox that actually showcases the power and quality of the machine.
It’s always negative news there’s not much to look foward to than more delays.
can't wait till a.i. start replacing game developers. then we may get games made in 2 or 3 years instead of 10 years.
The 12 month showcase is only possible once you are in state where you are actually releasing multiple games per quarter...n we're clearly not there yet. It sounds like it might actually be a thing this year but we'll see. I like knowing what they are working on that's further out so having a mixture is good unless one day you have the 12 month show (can't miss your dates) and another one looking out further than that.
Really pumped for the June show either way, love me some gamepass news.
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No PC gameplay at the showcase unless it is a PC exclusive.. thanks..
I have been playing Xbox since year one not day one but close it was the system that got me into elder scrolls. I loved the first fable. I can show some patients I think the one thing that irritates me though is announcing games that are a trillion years out. On the other hand if they don't announce there working on fable we're just going to be inundated with the rumors. So maybe they should have just said hey we're working on fable it being done by this studio but it's a while out. I am stoked about starfield if it's as good as the elder scrolls games that's going to be great and shut up lot of this nonsense.
@themightyant Saying the showcase would focus on the next 12 months would do the trick because a focus doesn't mean everything has to be in that time window. Like how the February 2023 Nintendo Direct was announced to be focused on the 1st half of 2023 and naturally had some games that were releasing later:
Everything else comes out before the end of June 2023.
@Grumblevolcano Exactly! Focus on the next 12 months, without the strict pressure of if MUST hit within 12 months (games slip frequently, and for good reason) while also having a little to look forward to in the not too distant future. Focus on gameplay. To me, assuming the games look good, that’s a pretty perfect showcase
Cordon said his claim is ‘mostly speculation’…by basically taking what Phil said to the kindafunny guys. Not exactly a hot scoop… given out of the 3 first party games xbox showed last year starfield got delayed, Forza still doesn’t have a date, and redfall should have been delayed further. Just embarrassing all around for them. And one of the many MANY reasons why the redfall backlash was always more than just the state of the game.
As obvious as this is, I mean even the show last year dedicated to a 12month window announced a kojima game that they knew was years away…I do take what Jez says with a pinch of salt. Guy was putting money on Avowed releasing last year… over 12 months later we still haven’t seen gameplay let alone a hint at a date. So…
It seems like some people only read the headline or something. I don't think Microsoft are saying that NONE of the games they.show are coming out in the next year, just that there will be a few that are farther out. Microsoft doesn't like to provide release dates anyway, and they probably feel like they burned themselves last year promising those games would be out within a year. Honestly if they say Forza, Starfield and maybe Hellblade 2 will be out within a year, maybe finally show Fable and State of Decay, with maybe a teaser of Elder Scrolls, I'd be satisfied.
When they did the 12 month window showing, I actually liked it. I thought it was a good idea, but then Xbox couldn’t get the games out in that window of time. It gave Xbox haters more ammo to go after Xbox and their fans.
Going forward I’d like to see them show us more on the games they already announced, and not reveal anything new until it’s closer to completion. Maybe something massive they can announce a little early, but some of the games they announced in 2020 were so far out and even still are years away. I’m looking forward to this years show. Hopefully they find a formula that works for them.
Will say time and time again, if developers would stick to the "Golden 6 Month Rule" everything would be much, much better. No one has provided a good argument against it that can sway me yet.
I think the problem is everyone expectations. Microsoft bought these studios when they were already had a game just released or an exclusive contract with PlayStation.
It takes 400 developers to release a AAA title in two years. None, keyword none of Microsoft Studios have 400 developers. PlayStation has eight Studios over 400, three of them are over 800.
Microsoft has seven developers that are around 100 some less.
But Microsoft has to have something to showcase at the shows.
That’s why Microsoft needs this Activision blizzard king merger. It’ll get them closer to the development, power of PlayStation.
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