BrilliantBill

@BacklogBrad The issue is with the Mandalorian show. After that all fans argue that Pedro Pascal is under the suite 95% of the time without showing his face and he gets paid. Why can't this Pablo guy do the same?
But I think is is kind of a poor comparison. Because in Mandalorian the actor is almost only doing voice acting and all scenes with Mando are done by a stunt actor.

@Sakai Also, in games, at least before that Halo 4 Legendary Ending scene. You could reason that we just don't know what he looks like (even the devs don't know, there is no concrete face model for him). So you can make up your own idea of what he looks like and kind of project yourself into being in the suite.

But in a TV show even if they never reveal his face, you are one IMDB search away from seeing it is this actor's face under it. There is no point in attempting to always hide it. Plus, there is no story reason for it either (as there is for Mandalorian due to his creed banning him from showing his face to others).

@Kaloudz I am still kinda surprised he has decided to push back hard and basically say something like "Just don't watch it". I don't know how many viewer numbers they have. But dude seems confident show is doing well either way.

I mean, apparently the whole VA "industry" is just Troy Baker, Nolan North, Laura Bailey and Ashley Burch (and back in the day Jennifer Hale but she is less present now I feel). It feels less like an industry of many diverse talents where everyone is voiced by the same 4 people. I would have much preferred someone else for Indy. Games like Alan Wake, Control, RDR2, Hellblade etc certainly benefitted by having VAs other than the same 5 people.
For Indy in general, I guess that's fine. Baker is a sure bet, it may not turn out as iconic or memorable but he won't totally F it up either.

Absolute A for the bit with Todd Howard stealing the golden item in the background.

All around incredible looking. But the voice isn't working for me at all, is it Troy Baker ?

@Kaloudz Yes, cue the Halo music.

and you can already imagine the clickbait videos on Youtube about how this destroyed both franchises.

@Kaloudz Of course the great circle is ... Halo.
😂😂

@ParsnipHero You are spot on. There is a lot of meta-commentary in Infinite. A lot of it is just a game about "Halo games". All those flashback style "echoes" with Cortana, Halsey, Keyes etc included. I think Infinite is, more than any other Halo, dedicated to being for Halo fans.
@Kaloudz Half the internet believes that Halo is all about its MP and other half believes it is all about Campaign. But either way Infinite really did a good job on both. Now with the switch to UE5 they can do all things smoother and more quickly hopefully.

The other good news is that with Xbox having so many other games (including a tiny niche indie title called Call of Duty 😂) there is less pressure for Halo to carry the brand.

I couldn't really get back into Asylum (too linear and too outdated by now) but finished City and Knight again last year. Solid games. Knight is kinda underrated.

People keep mentioning Sony doing it. But Sony's position is very different from Xbox. They are the dominant console seller for two generations and with the confused and awkward strategies of Xbox this gen they will also win the next gen. Releasing their exclusives, even day and date on PC really won't hurt them in a tangible way.
The only reason to have an Xbox "box" is now GP and existence of exclusives (which aren't truly exclusive due to releasing on PC but whatever). Now if those same games are on PS5, there is fewer and fewer arguments for buying a box from Xbox.
The only way this works is if it is only for online and GaaS titles. Maybe the odd small indie. The day I see Halo, Gears or Avowed elsewhere the "Xbox" brand is too diluted for me.
@Kaloudz I have this "doom and gloom" theory, hear me out.
The cost of developing games is high, very high. If you are Xbox and your studios take double the normal time to ship their games (I won't name any names but cough ...343, Rare cough...) that cost goes even higher. The install base of Xbox consoles sold and GP subs so far is not big enough to justify the development of exclusives. Therefore, one way or the other, these games need to find a bigger audience somewhere, they already tried PC, so the eventual Switch 2 and PS5 are the only places left. Meanwhile the presence of Xbox exclusives as exclusives is not moving quite enough boxes to homes because there have been too few of them, too widely spaced out and many of them didn't make an impact. So eventually some of them, smaller or older ones, will have to go to other platforms to make some money.

As long as it is one of those tiny "no-impact" exclusives like HiFi Rush or Pentiment I think this is fine.

@BIG3 In general, Largely depends on how strictly you define "Halo" based on the original trilogy and Bungie era games. If you vibe with Halo 4,5,Infinite. Most of the show is decent.

I mean, it is disappointing, but again, the overall reaction of bulk of Halo "fans" to Halo content featuring a story has been very rough in the past decade. Much of it is 343's own faults (the plot of Halo 5 😂) but a big chunk of it is also some exaggerated vitriol and hatred from the fans.
@Odium Halo 5's plot course and events really hurt Halo canon so badly.

TGA better bring out some solid content to remain valid coming after this megaton drop from GTA.

@ParsnipHero Kai was really quite a cool character, the actress killed it with that one. I really love that character.

Halo : AM I A JOKE TO YOU?

I mean, this is legit crazy. Infinite is now well past its "should have been there at launch" phase and really hitting a stride.
Just give me that Firefight mode 343i.

@InterceptorAlpha I guess, if big evil corporate only forces studios to make games in established IPs or formats that is messed up and milking the franchise. If they let the developer be free and creative, sometimes you get some gems. Other times it is in development for 7 years and amounts to nothing. It is damned if you and damned if you don't.
I think the harshest example is The Last Guardian, that game started on PS2 and launched on PS4. Never registered or made a big impact either.

@AlwaysPlaying I mean, they said it will start in 2024 right?

@Markatron84 Absolutely a given with the bromance between Keighley and Kojima.

I am hoping for decent XGS content. Whatever it can be, especially after their complete no show last year.

@x3King84 At least in US it seems like a large enough number. In EU, well it is kinda as @InterceptorAlpha said, lots of same gamertag and ofc mostly very skilled.

@OldGamer999 You raise some very legit points. But again, Xbox is seemingly in an odd place, because on one ends it makes the biggest industry shifting moves (buying ABK, putting CoD on GP eventually etc). Meanwhile it somehow manages to remainn the most niche and boutique brand of console and gaming.

A large part of this is due to their poor handling of their AAA catalogue, a couple years back Xbox was deeply critiqued for relying on Halo,Gears,Forza cycles. Either intentionally (last Gears game was 2019) or unintentionally (Halo Infinite's 6 year long dev cycle, failure at launch and very slow recovery), Xbox set aside this reliable trio (outside of the FH games, mainline Forza was also retired for years) and then never made anything as big or important to fill their place. So as much as having just Halo and Gears is meh, we now have neither on top of having no other cool thing either. I would be very happy to get Halo, Gears, Forza on 3-year dev cycles each instead of 34 Indies and 7 AA games.
But again when you whole strategy is GP, you cannot have 200 AAA juggernaut games there, you always need smaller and niche titles so that you can make a "fat" offering with acceptable cost.

@Sol4ris Ofc there is no way you just scrap your game completely and make a different one over course of more or less a year.
I guess they are just trying to market it better. Eitherway better to just launch this and get it out of the way. If it fails they can make another game at least. Not if it is forever in the oven.

Not at all. Specially since I am rarely and indie-game or vintage-game gamer. But I still treasure having Batman Telltale Series from GOLD.

@BacklogBrad Yeah among all the criticism that gaming journalism does towards CoD, they still ignore that fact that the amount and quality of content in a CoD game is staggering compared to many other shooters, almost all shooters.

MW3 is definitely an off-year sure, and enough has been screamed about greed of evil Activision, but still stunning they shipped this much in 16 months.

@Banjo- There is a little more nuance to this than just that. You are right that Sony games get preferred treatment (Horizon games wouldn't be as high rated if they weren't PS exclusives for example) but at the same time, one thing that Sony has nailed and Xbox is still messing around with is "visual presentation". The one thing that all PS exclusive AAA have is that they are graphically state of the art and overall when you see the games running they look mind blowingly good. On Xbox outside of Forza racers and the yearly clip of Hellblade 2, there is no such example (the latest proper example was again Gears 5 which was graphically fantastic for its time). All of the games are visually outdated and flawed (Starfield and Halo Infinite both suffered badly from this) and critics will never admit they rated a game higher because of graphics, but they always do. Look back at 2018's two GOTY candidates and two of the "perceived" best games of past few years, RDR2 and GoW 2018, they both look graphically stunning even today. This year's nominees, Spiderman 2 and AW2, both graphically top of the line etc.

@Chuffer I mean, Starfield is nominated for best RPG, that seems fair and enough.
@Titntin Over the years there have been some games that got collectively waved off by gaming community despite being very solid offerings (most recent example is Gears 5). But generally Xbox often misses the mark in making "absolutely fantastic" games and they always land a little below that. I am still waiting for Xbox to make that one proverbial (10/10) masterpiece of a game.

@InterceptorAlpha Is that really not normal? I don't know how it was before but at least in CoD free rewards are very rare in BP and almost always they are just some banners and profile pics. At best a skin? There are guns as part of it to be fair. But again Halo is hardly interested in creating new guns all the time. Franchise has been relying on broadly the same guns since Halo 4.

@DennisReynolds Based on reviews Starfield isn't GOTY material. Hi-Fi Rush would have had a chance but again it is a very crowded year. Even if nominated I doubt either of them would have won. AW2 and BG3 are the critic darlings this year.

@Darude84 I don't know. Honestly I love MGS and too me Death Stranding is just ... let's say not a game I liked at all. So I don't know if the reverse would map the same way. I would say that go for it but keep in mind these games are very very old and not enhanced in any way.

@RazputinAquato There are several problems with Starfield. For the amount of hype generated behind it, the game quickly fizzled out. Just-good-enough graphics, barren planets, cliche environment designs that we have often seen elsewhere in SciFi and absence of many cool elements that could-have-been (like vehicle traversal). On top of that, the issues with dozens of loading screens. The next problem is all the fuzz about "mods" and "modding community". While on PC it is quite legit. On console games are supposed to be cool "made by the developer", not 7 years later by 178 different modders.
I think problem is that the exaggerated success of Skyrim, has led Bethesda to take a bit of "this is a platform" approach to this game. Assuming from start that people will be playing this for the next 15 years, so they can go about making it better and more complete over time. Instead of aiming for a truly badass game on launch.

@OldGamer999 Genuinely need more great Halo and Gears games. These franchises carried Xbox.

@OldGamer999 They always knew but I doubt a 50 dollar cut or a DELL gift card could sell a Series X in the barren wasteland that Xbox had in terms of games back in the 2020 to 2023. Success of a console in the market is a combo of elements not just one move.

@Cherip-the-Ripper More like StarTrek Hub 😂.
Honestly when you open it the first time there is just ST, Sheridanverse😂 and yeah ... Halo.
@themightyant It is the only single player Halo content you get. For better or worse 😂

@JokerBoy422 Problem in particular with game industry is that, the development of games has become so so long now that a large chuck of gaming community probably won't mind getting next entry in their franchise 1-2 years sooner if it means some 50-100 people lost a Job in a studio. It is dark but kinda true.

The layoffs have more to do with the terrible management and poor business analysis and strategies of companies (guided by top management) than they have to do with AI. All these layoffs are happening well before the AI thing and have always been a thing. For example in case of Bungie, they are shocked that adding to their staff to help milk a game for the 6th year in a row somehow failed.
Regarding the creativity, games haven't been creative for ages now. Almost every game you play, you have seen something like it before. Also, the applications of it specially in terms of NPCs is very relevant. I am tired of how many times I ran into the same NPC in AC Odyssey only with a slight change of hair color.

Bruh, Jason Schreier is the most legit leaker. So I guess maybe it really is happening.

@Kaloudz The Xbox servers will experience some serious pressure the day they drop those games on GP. We are all looking forward to it. By the looks of it we might even get this MW3 some point in 2024 as well. So days of paying 50 bucks for CoD "ON SALE!?" is behind us.

@Kaloudz MW1 2019 was a solid re-invention in general, but ever since that one MW is sticking too closely to the missions from that game as a template.
Too bad people treated Infinite Warfare unnecessarily harshly, it could have been a better 2nd franchise of IW to work on and diversify the palette a bit.

@senote There is a very wide gap between "quirky and weirdo cool guy Elon" and well... one of the wealthiest most influential people on earth that is the "Overlord" of several big corporations in key industries.

@Kaloudz At this point those stealthy missions are just a chore to get through, it is always like "Who put Splinter Cell in my CoD?!", except the ALONE mission in MW2 which was decent and the "SWAT-team style" clearing a hideout as well as the AC130 mission are both equally played out. They have really leaned too hard on repeating the popular beats of past games and making these "Greatest Hits" moments.
Just give us a proper shooting gallery full on "War" experience like MW2 and MW3 of the past did.

Would love to see if these tools make development of those 6-8 year development games any faster. A game like Starfield used a lot of generated terrain (same as AI) but still it took ages to release and the generated content was a negative aspect.

@Sol4ris Well somehow they gotta fund 6 years of development (bulk of which was spent on their own Engine that was meant to be the foundation for the next decade, ditched soon in favour of UE5).

@GamingFan4Lyf If Xbox transcends beyond consoles, it will be a cloud thing.
The idea of selling specific PC hardware as a pseudo-console has been tried before and failed (Steamboxes) and given how the 2nd attempt (Steam Deck and similar) often struggle a lot with AAA cutting edge games, it is probably failing a second time.
You cannot have benefits of both worlds by selling off the shelf PC parts in a box and hoping to magically benefit from all benefits of set-in-stone console hardware optimisation.

@rustyduck Given the leaked plans for the next Xbox consoles, Xbox plans to stay a hardware manufacturer for another 15 years I guess. If you sell something as massive as ABK+Bethesda+XGS line up of games on your service, it makes sense to sell the box to play these games too.

Well it seems with IGN's 4/10 for MW3 we are in for an exciting ride this fall 😂.

@BAMozzy Microsoft has been actively deprioritising split-screen since back in Halo 5. They just have something against it.

@Nepo It is a very common indie-game art style as these games try to avoid photorealism that is necessary in AAA space.

Seeing their recent work I have fear it will be once again 100 tons of genre tropes,style and homage/rip off paired with a very basic gameplay design.
@Rmg0731 AW1 released very near to RDR1 (arguably a better game in many regards) and AW itself was a bit of a letdown at the time of its release from what I remember. I played the remaster recently and while it is generally solid enough. I struggled to see anything special about it.
@InterceptorAlpha I wouldn't quite say so, they are good for sure. But they are yet to release any one game that truly dominates in terms of sales or in terms of GOTY potential. They are definitely unique and niche and good in what they do. But I don't think they ever cleared a bar that made them a must-buy for Xbox or even Sony. I already have more faith in Ninja Theory or other Xbox teams pulling off better AAA games with lots of style, flair and storytelling.

Hands down the best game I have ever played. An absolute 10/10.