BHPM

@nomither6 Nothing at all, I would say. But I know that at least a lot of the Call of Duty fans that I know consider the futuristic ones black sheep of the franchise, and decent at the very best. But yeah Advanced Warfare was my preferred one, I think primarily because of the overall flow of the gameplay and how mobile your character felt, it made it feel fairly engaging to me I guess you could say.

From my experience with Gears of War, I found it to be fine, but not amazing (although as a technical showpiece it has often been stunning). Definitely a quality game, but I guess it just wasn't ever what I was looking for at a given moment. Definitely willing to give it another shot though.
If we are now counting this as an Xbox franchise, I could never get into Call of Duty. Interestingly, the only one I ever had any fun with was Advanced Warfare of all things. Yeah, I don't know either how that came to be. In fact most Activision Blizzard franchises I would be willing to say - there are definitely some ones in there that I love, but I'd say the majority of them have never really won me over.
Age of Empires too, but not for any reason specific to this franchise, I just am not into that genre very much.

Nice, a great game, so it's great to see a sequel finally coming! But man, it's so wild to me that this game was almost a decade ago...

For me, it completely depends on what such a console would offer in terms of specifications, unique features, etc.

Great news! Glad they were able to work together on this. I'm particularly excited for Capcom Fighting Collection 2!

Took like 20 minutes but it just clicked: this will be the first Atelier game on Xbox, won't it? That's pretty cool, nice to see that Xbox fans get a chance to try the series out. It has never been my favourite JRPG series, but it's still a decent enough time, and it certainly has its fans!

Never was too interested in ports of DS games to other platforms personally (always just preferred those games which were designed for the DS to be played on a dual screen platform, and plus in general I just have a really soft spot for the DS, but that's all just me of course), but the remake of Haunted Castle does tempt me!

Sweet! I was hoping a physical release for this would come out eventually on Xbox, but honestly I didn't expect it to actually happen. Definitely will be getting myself a copy!

Oh now THIS is what I like to see! I adore Sniper Elite.

Sick! For one reason or another, I have for a while been a bit of a fan of these guys. Their games sometimes are great, sometimes aren't, but for me they usually at least have this certain charm. I dunno, probably just a personal thing. Still, a lot of this looks great, can't wait to see more details! Titan Quest 2 and Wreckfest 2 have me excited, and a new Darksiders definitely has my interest piqued!

Just picked up Forza Horizon 4 Ultimate Edition! I already own a disc copy, but I missed out on getting any of the DLC, so this was my way of catching up on all of the DLC, especially since it is so cheap at the moment.

@armondo36 Hard to say, hard to say. But for sure, it's clear that Microsoft doesn't particularly care about Xbox all that much, which is strange considering all of the major acquisitions that have happened, as well as the fact that I believe official data has shown that Xbox is quite profitable. I would think that Microsoft would care more about a division which makes them a good amount of money (in fact last I checked, gaming makes more money for MS than Windows), but here we are...

Either the big boys and girls at Microsoft somehow believe that they can get away with not marketing the Xbox and still have the console be successful (they cannot), or they simply don't care about the success of their gaming divisions, which is funny considering I believe I saw statistics showing that gaming was like their third most profitable division or something like that. Not going to pretend like I, some random guy, knows more about how Microsoft's business should be run than Microsoft themselves, but something doesn't quite add up here to me, as it almost feels like they are deliberately throwing away opportunities to increase profit, which is wild after you complete a $70 billion acquisition in your gaming division.

I was never a fan of Blades at all admittedly, but it's very nice that they would add this for those who have better taste than myself.

By obligation, Microsoft CANNOT be on a roll for too long without some sort of controversy to shake things up and lose consumer trust. Can't get people to have TOO much trust in your brands now, that would be just awful...

@themightyant Yeah you are definitely right. I just wish that the different sites could stick with news pertaining to their own console. It always comes across as very console warriorish to me when I see an article like that. It's like when one of the sites publishes an article about not getting a game that other consoles are getting. These types of articles always to me come across as trying to "rally the fanboys" of whatever console, get people angry over nothing or get people super egotistical over their choice of plastic box.
Sorry, long rant. In summary, I greatly dislike articles that just seem to be serving the egos of people over their choice of plastic box. I know that in technicality it's relevant, but to me it always comes across as "see X console IS better than Y console because X console does things that way while Y console does things THIS way!", and stuff like that. Like, can't we all just enjoy whatever console we use, or multiple consoles like myself, without having to justify why we are soooo much better than the other console or why we are soooo much more second-class than the other console?
...Sorry haha, I talk too much. Bad habit.

Unfortunate for those who use Game Pass, but I can't pretend that this isn't sensible to at least some extent. Catching up with inflation (and then some, for a few extra $ of course) is necessary, but also in general, day one Game Pass games was a very bold move to make right from the beginning. Forcing you to cough up a few extra dollars to get the privilege of having games day one is a bit crappy, but I can see why they are doing it. Game Pass subs aren't increasing as fast as they want it seems to the point where there previously bold value proposition for Game Pass might have had quite a bit more profit and thus been more sensible as a product, so this was the decision they made. Greedy? Yeah, kind of. But also, Game Pass was perhaps a tad bit too generous from the start for its own good to be a truly viable product (I would think at least). The real issue is how Microsoft got everybody used to Game Pass being this crazy value proposition for so long before in an instant tearing that down right before everyone's eyes; they got people used to it being so crazy good, so now resetting that value proposition to something arguably more "realistic" just looks really bad for them.

...Also, completely underrated, but I was taking bets on if our good friends over at Push Square (who I do love, don't get me wrong) would publish an article about this despite it having nothing to do with them, just as an I-told-you-so and tooting their own horn about PS Plus's strategy vs. that of Xbox Game Pass. Sure enough, haha...

Agreed. I love some denser, "commitment" games as I like to call them, I really do, but I also adore games that you can just pick up and instantly start having a good time. Every now and then I'll just boot up Streets of Rage 2 for a few minutes to quickly play through the first stage, having a blast. Or I'll play a few rounds of Qix, or maybe for a more modern game, just do a quick run of The Binding of Isaac. Heck, one thing I often like to do is space out my playthroughs of "commitment" games with "pick-up-and-play" games to avoid burnout.

Over time I have had more and more obligations arise which take me away from the amount of gaming that I used to do. However, I am trying my hardest to pry back some free time wherever I can find it to spend on the things I enjoy.

Correction: "There are worlds in some of our older Assassin's Creed games that can still make us extremely rich"

Wow, that's genuinely a night-and-day difference. That's much, much more appealing to the eye.

Xbox's current gamble is being on as many screens as possible, not just the screen to which you may or may not have an Xbox console hooked up. I don't think that this will actually take away from their sales that much like some claim, as I think most people, especially those with shaky internet speeds, would prefer to play their games natively as opposed to over the cloud whenever possible. With that being said, let's see how this gamble works out for them.

...Oh, and it goes without saying, but stuff like this would really benefit from Xbox finally allowing you to play your owned games over the cloud, whenever we'll finally see that from them. Apparently that's meant to finally be a thing in 2024, so unless it got delayed then that should be available in about 6 months or less.

Huh, 10% really isn't bad for the Steam Deck. Obviously far behind PS and Xbox controllers, but it has definitely made a noticeable impact. Nice to see that it has been successful, as while I'm not sure if it's really for me, it's definitely a very good product. Hope it continues to grow in popularity!

Huh, interesting. On one hand we already have a remaster of Dead Rising available on Xbox One and PS4 and thus playable on Series X/S and PS5, but on the other hand that was clearly quite a low effort remaster. It'll be interesting to see what happens with this one.

Glad that they gave us notice on the game's delisting and are going to be discounting the game starting next month so it seems, but I would have really appreciated if they gave more notice on the DLC going down, for those of us who already own the game but don't already have all the DLC we want for it yet. Still, at least it's still accessible for the time being, just in a less convenient manner.

I am excited and will be glad to see it finally come out, but I am going to be fully honest, I don't expect it to be a masterpiece. A great game, but not a masterpiece. I expect somewhere in like the 75-80 range. But I am more than willing to be pleasantly surprised!

Nice, can't wait, I enjoyed this game quite a lot when I was younger. The gameplay itself is good but not amazing, but the aesthetic and overall presentation really just brings the whole experience home! Can't wait to see what they do with the remaster. All I hope is that the controls are still good on platforms such as Xbox, as I don't know if this is a hot take or not but I think the Wii controls for the game worked very well, so I just hope that in translation to say an Xbox controller it still controls just as well.

Awesome, I'm really glad to hear that this is a good remaster. I will 100% be getting this then! Not a bad price too all things considered! I thought Ubisoft was going to price it a good bit higher than that.

Huh, very interesting use of their recently acquired Intellivision IPs, not only releasing those games into Atari 50 (as DLC, mind) but also taking the opportunity to tell the story of the Atari vs Intellivision war, since there is no longer any need to license anything that might have otherwise previously been required to fully tell that story! Nice idea in my opinion by the teams at Atari and Digital Eclipse (which is of course now owned by Atari).

@OldGamer999 Absolutely! Both this showcase and 2023's showcase in my opinion were the best showcases of both years, so clearly they are on to something. They just need to keep doing what they are doing, and of course, deliver at or above the quality that they are setting our expectations at.

And man, I know that it is so overdone now and basically every showcase by every company has the "one last thing" at the end, but every time it gets me so hyped since they all usually saved the best for last hahaha

Personally, I am interested in seeing a Forza (Horizon) and Halo reveal specifically because I want to see what those games look like when they are designed with only 9th generation hardware in mind, rather than being cross-platform with the Xbox One like Forza Horizon 5 and Halo Infinite were. Same reason I was interested in seeing the Gears of War reveal, and while I know that no gameplay has been shown for that yet, it still seems like the tech will be very promising, especially knowing The Coalition's decent track record.

AAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWW YEAH BUBSY, BABY!
Bubsy 3D better be in there or they have no guts haha.
" Along the way the team was able to smooth out some of the games’ rough edges" - I'm sure this means that Bubsy 3D will finally become the 10/10 that it deserves, as with the rest of the franchise.
...Oh yeah, the other games there were cool too. Getting a physical and digital Ninja Five-O on modern consoles (except Xbox...) is nuts, as that game is one of the most expensive GBA games. Cosmic Fantasy Collection 2 was an awesome surprise, as with Tomba 2 getting remastered as well, and Gimmick 2 being made. Great to see Gex pop up again, and great to see BGaE is getting a physical, I honestly thought that Ubi would make it digital only. Plenty of other cool stuff too! Not a top tier showcase, but still pretty good overall!

@Fiendish-Beaver I got all of the Gears of War 3 DLC on Xbox 360 a few weeks ago. From my experience, everything worked except for the Season Pass (the in-game DLC menu had a checkmark next to nothing after I got the season pass and I was not prompted anywhere for free downloads of the season pass content, but after I bought all of the DLC individually everything popped up with a checkmark so I am pretty darn sure it all worked), and the Lancer Omen weapon skin needed to be bought on Xbox One/Series and then re-downloaded on 360, as purchasing that one on 360 did not work at all for me. Of course, it's possible that your your experience might be different. But if you are playing GoW 3 on Xbox One/Series, the Xbox 360 store shutdown affects absolutely nothing, so if that is the case then you have nothing to worry about.

@GlasgowGuy Huh, from your experience it sounds like OG Xbox games in particular are having quite a few issues, none of which I have tried to buy yet. I'll keep that in mind. Luckily at least with those the original discs also work with the 360, but not everybody has easy access to those or wants to use those of course, so that's still rather annoying for some.

As the article says, from my experience buying single DLC packs has worked fine virtually all of the time, so just do that. Some DLC simply doesn't work, but that's the vast minority, and you can easily tell what DLC it is by going into your storage and seeing if the DLC has a yellow exclamation mark symbol or whatever next to it, even after the download has allegedly completed. Sometimes this indicates that you need to redownload, but sometimes this is a sign of the DLC just not working, period. I will also repeat the warning of season passes: I tried two of them, and both didn't work, not knowing at the time that this was a known issue. Luckily I got refunded, but yeah, just don't even bother attempting season passes, specifically those where you have to go in and get the DLC from in-game afterwards (hello, Gears of War 3 and Judgment). As for games, I'm happy to say that after buying a ton of them, the vast vast majority download just fine. Funny enough, the only ones I have had any trouble with thus far were all backwards compatible titles, so I fixed that problem by buying them on my Xbox One and then going into download history on my 360 to get them, and that way worked.
Hope this advice and warnings might help anybody who is doing any last minute buying on the 360! It's mostly fine as long as you know what to avoid, and are patient enough for certain things to give you an error code once or twice before like the third time it lets you download them. An unfortunate state of affairs that it is like this at all though, of course.

@Nintendo4Sonic Well, both Series X and One, their standard controllers (I rarely use third party controllers, just not usually really my thing). I mean I do still suck at fighting games in general haha, but they are the only two d-pads on which I can consistently pull off a hadouken 100% of the time. I own most Nintendo, Sega, MS, and Sony consoles, and on no other console can I do this (Saturn is the close second, where usually I can get it, but not always). So that's my metric, really. With regards to say 2D platformers and stuff I have always preferred the PS and Nintendo (except Switch, I loathe the joycons haha) style d-pads over every Xbox d-pad, but I do still usually find the Xbox d-pads fine enough to still get a very enjoyable experience. But thanks a lot for the suggestions, I'll definitely keep those in mind!

@anoyonmus Yeah, likely. And it's a shame too, as when it comes to playing fighting games using a console's default controller, Xbox One and Xbox Series have my favourite d-pad for fighting games of any d-pad I have tried, even ranking slightly above the widely beloved Saturn d-pad for me.

Not really my thing, but unfortunate to see after Xbox did in fact get Capcom Fighting Collection a couple years ago. Perhaps sales on that particular one were too weak on Xbox for them to justify bringing this over? I don't know, I'm just spitballing here.

Yeah 94 is about what I expected haha. Hail FromSoftware!

Fantasian in particular has me very excited! I always wanted to play it, so it's awesome that it's finally hitting consoles.

I hate to be that guy, but I hope that this maybe, just maybe, could pave the way for Xbox actually putting reasonable effort into marketing going forward. Marketing is so much more important to the brand's success than many might realize.

I liked the idea of it conceptually, but the last sentence of the quote from IGN's review is why personally many of these "walking sims" as some call them are not really my cup of tea. I'm sure there's something to be said about experiencing it yourself with you controlling the game, but I don't know, whenever I watch gameplay of these types of games I just can't shake the feeling that I'm not missing much by not playing it. But hey, that's just me! Hope people enjoy this one as much as it has been hyped!

Looks cool, but I honestly might stick with the original. I know there's not much they can do about it really, but losing the original soundtrack is kind of a dealbreaker to me. That game's main points towards it are its style, and the original soundtrack was a big factor in contributing to that style. With all due respect to the devs, I'm not sure anything they do with the soundtrack on this new version could possibly replace the original for me.

Well, that sounds pretty close to what people were asking for, so hopefully the execution is on point and this turns into something special.

I never had a problem with Creation Club, personally, as if you like it then cool, but if you don't like it then it is very easy to ignore. I will say that Creation Club was very nice for PS4 players of Fallout 4 whose mod options were otherwise limited to those with vanilla assets only (although of course I will not at all argue that the Creation Club content was very overpriced across the board).

I will confirm this as factual, as Xbox Wire is quoted as saying "Fans can still purchase the Carbon Black Series S with 1TB while supplies last". So in other words, they're done making them now, and you can still get one provided that there is still one to get. Source: https://news.xbox.com/en-us/2024/06/09/xbox-series-x-s-new-console-options/

Well, I guess Beyond Good and Evil 20th Anniversary Edition isn't launching in early 2024 after all then. I would have expected an announcement at some point in the past 6 months regarding its delay, but whatever, not like it's a big deal. I mean, especially since you can already buy Beyond Good and Evil HD on Xbox One and Series X/S.

@NEStalgia Great point, I hadn't considered that. I would hope then that if they were to do this, they would opt for Series S over One S, even if that would cost as much as I'd expect it would.

Well, at least at least he is being upfront about it this time and not really dancing around it (well, not as much as before, at least). I appreciate the honesty in what the plan is going forward. I can't say I entirely agree with the strategy, but hey it's not my company! As long as it doesn't result in an erosion of the Xbox brand, then I'm happy.

Okay I'm going to be honest, I'm cool with them having this fancy "when everybody plays we all win" catchphrase, but when you repeat it over and over again, word for word as if it is something pseudo-religious, it just sounds so artificial. I don't know how to explain it, but I think it would have more weight if they didn't say it every single opportunity they possibly can fit it in.