Somehow, "play an unspecified selection of games at an undetermined future date, possibly, for just one dollar" doesn't roll off the tongue like the old slogan.
"Play less games, much later, for the same price you paid last year" has a better ring to it, doesn't it?
The pricing split kind of reminds me of those used listings on eBay and Amazon. You know, the one where you see
Used: Acceptable condition- may be worn and show signs of wear, missing original package, missing accessories, device is tested to function, includes base components only. $449.99. Next to the new in box one for $479.99.
Also, while watching the video I realized how convenient it is that this site is already green. As Xbox collapses and becomes a PC publisher, the site can just rebrand to PureNvidia and replace the little X-ball watermarks with swirly-eyes.
@Steel76 "I wish PS and Xbox consoles used Nvidia instead. "
Introducing PS6 and Series Y, Powered By Nvidia RTX / Starting at just $1299.99 (8GB VRAM model. Some games may require 12GB.)
Yeah, Nvidia is just plainly ahead, and it's a shame where AMD is. Not sure where they went wrong. AMD is better at raw rasterization, and always packs more VRAM (stingy Nvidia...), but way behind on RT. Their scaling isn't bad, but their drivers are always behind. Though, to be fair a lot is the same problem as "games run better on PS than XB." over 90% of GPUs on Steam are Nvidia so devs just don't optimize for AMD at all. Starfield is the one example where the game works WAY better on AMD, and kinda sucks on Nvidia. It was AMD sponsored. Dev optimization has a LOT to do with the end result, and nobody will optimize AMD unless paid to because it's less than 10% of the market.
Doesn't help that AMD just bowed out of "high end GPUs" leaving the market to Nvidia alone. No profit. They said they could cut a die that competes with 4090 no problem, but it's not cost effective.
The only problem Nvidia is going to run into though is they're committed to monolithic dies, and they've just about maxed what they can do that way. AMD is moving into chiplets. That may put them ahead in some years. The downside for consumers is AMD likes to just move their pricing up to their competitors obscene pricing the moment they're ahead (Intel, Nvidia) so they're not applying price pressure on the market.
Intel of all companies represents the sole remaining hope of sanity for the GPU market. But it may be years away.
The other problem for PS6 and XSX though is just that they're ancient. The consoles should not have launched in 2020, full stop. They're glorified 8th gen machines built on 8th gen iterations of the tech. They're Pro-X Mk II models. They were built during the NV10/NV20 era, on AMD tech, they launched the very week the NV30's launched, and the NV30's blew away everything the outdated console did on launch day, especially where RT was concerned. These consoles tech even on AMD really just predate RT as an actual usable feature.
Sony was racing to reinvigorate the "old" PS4 sales, and cut off X1X from stealing market. MS had just launched 1X and scrambled to keep up to not be left behind by Sony. The result is AMD or NVida isn't the issue, the issue is both consoles launched 2+ years before they should have and thus used tech that was 1-2 years behind what it needed to be. X1X launched holiday 2017. Then started being shelved and "Scarlett" was hyped starting winter-spring 2019. The Series X is effectively 1.5-2 years newer than the 1X. It's barely a new model. And PS6 barely a different machine.
Maybe next gen will be dramatically better, but by then a lot of us have already moved from console to PC. Not everyone will, but the more the market shrinks the less value it will represent to recoup costs.
Makes sense, Crash is a Naughty Dog created IP, Spyro was Insomniac, and both together are probably the most key icons of the PS1 short of the FF games and MGS. MS isn't stingy with licensing their IP. It's only by a weird twist of business fate that Sony ended up owning both companies and MS ended up owning both their IPs.
@abe_hikura That's exactly. I do favor the end of exclusives, but one company just putting their games on competing platforms while the other company withholds theirs isn't ending exclusives, it's surrendering. Nintendo and Sony aren't compatible because their hardware is so differentiated. Nintendo has a cheap handheld, Sony has an expensive miniPC. So the hardware itself segments their market. Xbox doesn't have a hardware differentiation (this gen.)
The leaders Sega's console business were "running a business." The leaders of Lehman Brothers were "running a business" Liz Holmes was "running a business". Bernie Madoff was "running a business".
There's a lot of ways to "run a business."
While I have grown to doubt that Phil is running anything other than weekly contests, the question is otherwise what business is being run? They can run a successful publishing business. They can run a successful development studio. They can run an online service platform.
What I don't get about the Xbox hardware is, Microsoft is a platforms company. It's what they DO. How can the default platforms company not understand how to build and maintain successful platforms? How can they not understand their actions despite being good short term gains undermining their ability to have platform control? I get the "MS doesn't care about console" but MS does care about platforms. And how can they undervalue the power of being a dominant platform owner? Platforms is what they do!
PC was fine. Xbox=PC. PC=Xbox Pro we've known for years, and that's fine, because it's all Microsoft's ecosystem. Just caving and becoming a 3rd party console publisher makes little sense. I personally don't like exclusivity, and want it to be a relic of the past. I don't even mind all that. But they also need reasons to tell people is the ideal platform, and right now they have none other than "Game Pass".
@Markatron84 I personally do think Phil was genuine, and his vision is the one we were sold. The problem isn't so much that him being a public facing nice guy was a problem. It's that corporate removed him without removing him and decided to do things their way instead of his.
True that you always knew where you stood with Jim Ryan, but if we're down to debating dealing with a business that treats you like dirt, vs a business that was run by a guy that treats you as a customer until his superiors take over and decide to treat you as less than dirt....again, why are we even in this hobby?
I've said it before but the state of gaming is so bad I bought a Quest 3 and am actively giving money to Mark Zuckerberg as a preferred platform. That's how bad it's become.
1: Subscribe to highly popular controversial twitter feeds.
2: Have GPT write articles based on them.
3: ???
4: Profit!
(5: Get bought by IGN)
(6: Close down.)
@Cherip-the-Ripper It's built on a spinoff of the XIV engine which is a spinoff of Luminous. XIV runs buttery smooth. Everything else Luminous runs like hot garbage. The fps problems are weird though. Like, performance mode massively downgrades visuals until it's VERY low resolution, low textures, low LoD. But still drops into the 30s, even 20s. I'm guessing it's CPU bound and dropping the visuals doesn't help. But how does a PS5 exclusive game become CPU bound?!? And even if it targets 30fps, why would anyone design an action slasher around 30fps? With one platform? And even 30fps has terrible frame pacing so it feels more stuttery than it shoud .
@Ricky-Spanish What amazes me is this came on the heels of XV that was too ambitious and also ran horribly. It was produced by YoshiP who had to clean up the mess of the overambitious XIV and turn it into something good. Then he does the same exact thing with XVI. There's something in the water at S-E.
@Ricky-Spanish They couldn't even get the completely exclusive PS5 version to perform well. It's harder to do for them than you might think. Lets' see how much of a trainwreck PC is first.
Seems like pretty much a lock at their current trajectory.
Might end up double dipping on the game for PC though. I already bought and started playing up to half way through or a little beyond or so on PS5, and even bought the DLC on PS5, but now that I'm rebuilding around PC, and the game ran like chocobo dung on PS5, I think a PC version is kind of necessity for me at this point. Hopefully it doesn't run as badly as XV did. Sucks to throw away so much game progress though, not looking forward to redoing a few of those fights. It's a pretty good game. A horrible Final Fantasy game, but if you close your eyes, pretend it's not called XVI, and pretend it's a spinoff sequel of Stranger of Paradise, it's pretty good.
@HarmanSmith TBF Satya has a more robust collection of promises on AI than number of Windows licenses sold since 1990.
Yeah, I honestly don't know how they're pushing so hard on PC while running a store that makes EA Origin look like the future. How does one launch a PC gaming store that's missing most games?! It's the default pack-in store in Windows. You'd think it would be robust. Instead it's a vacuum. Hard to take the store seriously unless playing a game you already bought on XB and it happens to be on there.
I suspect the list of Play Anywhere titles is shorter than the list of BC titles. Which is sad. I have a huge XB library and my automatic PC library is barely one page from that.
@InterceptorAlpha Oh man, I didn't even know there WAS a Morrowind VR mod!
Does it support the mess of mods to pretty it up, and also the coop mods?
I know Skyrim takes like 100+ mods (and effectively requires a paid Nexus sub just to efficiently download them all) to make it totally pretty plus have adequate VR control/detection, and doesn't support the coop mod at all. If I could get Morrowind (and/or oblivion) with beautifying mods, that would be amazing.
I know Bethesda isn't Rockstar, but, these guys are literally promising to take Bethesda licenced content from a different game and put it in their mod, and I doubt Bethesda (or Amy Hood) are fond of someone distributing free copies of Oblivion with every Skyrim purchase.
If it really happened it would be my dream - especially if it works with Skyrim VR, but, I can not imagine the Bethesda/MS lawyers sleeping on "We're duplicating Oblivion and distributing for free."
I see Peter still reads Xbox news. Yeah. It has that effect.
@TheSimulator With Microsoft's history of being able to count by adding 1 to a number (95-96, 98, 2000, 7, 8, 8.1, 10, 11) do you really want them to be your timepiece?
"I have a meeting at 12:30, what time is it? Oh, it's 11:49, I've still got time left."
Often, when I'm browsing the store, I tend to forget about Game Pass, and I'm never sure when I'm looking at a game if I have to buy it or if I can play it and hundreds of other games on Game Pass. It might help if they could put more information up reminding people that Game Pass exists and that you can play games on Game Pass, or that a game is available on Game Pass or can be played instantly on the cloud with Game Pass.
Seriously though the only thing I think the store really needs is to bring back the feature they took away when series luanched which is being able to shop in the mobile app. PS lets me shop in the mobile app. Steam lets me shop in the mobile app. Other 3rd parties let me shop in the mobile app. Nintendo...well they're Nintendo. Xbox let you shop in the mobile app first, and then mysteriously disposed of it right when PS finally started supporting it.
Also, the Windows Store on PC. It needs games. Seriously, just, like any games. At all. Why does it have no games?
This has got to be the weirdest acquisition we've ever seen. Other than maybe THQ is there any other case in which a dead studio was purchased after it was dead? And why would MS close a studio if they're going to shop to sell it after they close it? Isn't that like eating the pizza and then trying to sell it?
@GuyinPA75 Phil did talk about multiple storefronts. Maybe that's next. Make purchases on PSN Store directly from your Xbox!
@Jenkinss Could be worse. The Win11 is hitting win+G every time you go into an HDR/non-HDR game and need to toggle HDR. Even if you're using controller.....
MS really needs to decide, even if it's just a marketing thing, what is the selling point of their console. They're selling it. They need to explain why people should want to buy it. "It's the same price as competitors and plays a subset of the same games nearly as well" isn't a good selling point. They tried to make it Game Pass, but only a subset of console buyers buy game pass and many of them buy only because of mandatory online.
No exclusives is fine. IT's what they wanted for Xbox One, too. That's fine. But what is the unique proposition of Xbox? That's what they're not communicating (or including.)
@Sol4ris In a vacuum, I agree. Where people get upset by it is inevitably it leads to attrition of the platform install base which inevitably leads to the company closing it due to low sales. Everyone here is financially invested in the long term prospects of the platform so every move that moves to damage the platform and its long term success is a damaging act to the financial stakeholders, (stakeholders, not shareholders), which would be everyone here.
Not sure if they're just going to go and do it and do Indiana Jones or Starfield or Forza Horizon (already one of the most played games on Steam so it's logical), or if they're going to spend 2 weeks letting the internet say it is without correcting it, only to later announce it's Blinx.
That's cool and all, but this stuff only works for Xbox/Windows Store games. Which would be great, if, y'know, the Windows Store actually had games beyond what's on Game Pass.
@Steel76 You got me curious enough to watch but I didn't find anything "hello, boomer" about it. It's just competitive shooter lingo, and super toned down as a PR piece video. Actually it seems like it hasn't changed from the 90's.
Now MMO lingo....that is a whole pot of confusion right there. That's less "hello, boomer" and more "hey neeeeeeeeeerdd." It took a month of googling just to figure out WTF all the acronyms were about from the guides trying to help when starting XIV!
@Fiendish-Beaver You're worse than me! From 360 I think I have only those two. I have a few PS4 games unopened. I do have the Persona 4 Take Your Heart Edition sealed and unopened, that's probably worth money, but nobody will ever pry my Morgana plushie from my cold dead hands. I have the steelbook FFXV sealed (the one with the movie you need to watch to understand the plot but without half the game in it.) Ni No Kuni II steelbook. I have some 3DS games unopened. MK7, a few more uncommon ones.
All tolled I probably have a good month of game pass at 2025 pricing in unopened games.
Someone needs to explain to the appraisers that all copies sold by Game Stop in the US would have been unsealed before purchase, so an unsealed case, with a disc with fingerprints on it that was re-buffed and "used only by employees" indeed does count as mint-unopened, according to GameStop, and thus should sell for the full $25,000.
@LX_FENIX Or better yet, when they pay to get HiFi Rush 2 as a Game Pass Day 1 launch title and dump a bunch of cash into it. Because you know they will. It was Game Pass's biggest game, don't you know! THAT would the most Microsoft Microsoft decision possible.
@Zenszulu Even that doesn't make sense because if they were selling the studio, that means including the talent, and if they shut them down while secretly planning to sell, by the time the buyer would get to the table the talent and therefore studio would be gone. And based on the filings, only Hifi Rush was included, not Evil Within or Ghostwire, so MS kept those (or so it seems.) Why tell the studio you're closing them, but keep paying them, then secretly out of nowhere announce you sold the studio and IP? Why not just find a buyer and then announce you sold the studio and avoid the massive PR fail?
The whole thing is weird. My gut feeling is that it's still part of the internal war going on. Corporate probably said to shut it down so they announced they're shutting it down. Then, remember Phil's answer during the SGF IGN interview about this: " I haven't been talking publicly about this, because right now is a time for us to focus on the team and the individuals. It's obviously a decision that's very hard on them and I want to make sure through severance and other things that we're doing the right thing for the individuals on the team. It's not about my PR, it's not about Xbox PR, it's about those teams."
At the time the quote seemed like weirdly out of character corporate babble. Now in hindsight it seems like he was keeping quiet while shopping buyers and that quote was an endrun around that. I get the sense he was hiding that effort from corporate more than from the audience.
Obviously SOMEONE had to be shopping a buyer because it doesn't pop up out of nowhere months later with an IP transfer after the studio heads have already lamented the closure publicly.
It's another feather in the "weird Xbox decisions" cap for sure, and probably another outward display of the raging internal war in the organization. Now we have guerilla warfare with internal organizations and owned IP!
That's surprising. It's relatively good news that the core market shows strength for the brand, that's something they can use to rebound elsewhere, but it's kind of hard to picture Series selling as well as 360 where in the US the 360 felt like a marketing phenomenon that was everywhere and Series, well, doesn't.
That's awesome, and also the most bizarre thing that I've seen in a while. So MS buys them with Zeni, then has a hit with them, then shuts them down when they want to make a sequel, then, months later.....we hear reports that they've SOLD them?! How did they close them and then sell them? After the staff already scrambled and presumably left?! And they sell the HiFI Rush IP, the hit IP that did so much for them so they said with it? And Bethesda is on board in transitioning the sale....
I'm happy Tango's not dead (assuming anyone was still left at Tango after they were told they were closing?), but what just happened?
I'll be fair to Phil, I assume this is what he meant by being quiet about it to make sure to do what's best for the employees etc...apparently they were finding a buyer for their announced closed studio. But it's still just so weird. Why not just sell the studio instead of announcing they're closing it then announcing they sold it? Once again I imagine an internal conflict with the head eating the tail again.
@Mustoe I disagree. The framing of your original post is that xbox is the bad choice, the really bad choice, the only logical way to read it is that the other choice(s) of consoles are much better.
There's arguments to be made for which one is the better/worse purchase, and there's plenty to say about what's wrong with Xbox, but the implication of that original post is that people would be much better off with a PS or Switch than an Xbox, and for a variety of reasons with those two that's also not automatically true.
In reality the state of consoles, and more accurately everything to do with gaming is heading down a deep, dark hole, maybe since the rice of mobile gamblegaming, and we'd all really be better off knitting.
@Mustoe again I agree, and we agree they're both just as bad, but I think the impression of coming on an Xbox site to badmouth Xbox exclusively creates the impression of console warring in favor of other brands when those brands are in fact also bad. Is not about defending Xbox because others are bad it's about not creating the image that others are good because Xbox is bad. "Xbox bad" instantly reads to most as "ps better".
@GuyinPA75 Yeah, at the old price I found some value in it. Little gems like little kitty big city I would've have never tried were nice to find. But at the new price I'll cancel. The big Microsoft games will cost about the same if I wait for sales, and heading PC,I probably won't even get it for PC. Way cheaper but again steam and 3rd pay keys mean I'll break even at best but own it, and I'm not playing all the indies much with a huge backlog of bigger games while my indies come mostly down to VR and even meta has an old Gold like sub for $60 a year for that. For me the gp math doesn't add up anymore. It might for PC, but then might as well do sales
@Mustoe I half agree, except when the console alternative is PayStation: For the Payers, feels like kind of a magic coin toss for the biggest tossers really.
There's PC, of course, but then we're the biggest losers. Jensen needs a new $5m leather jacket made of gamer centipede.
"Rational decisions." BRB, gonna head to a mirror store to pick up Zel's Christmas gift.
Zelnick is the only executive in gaming that actually makes me think "Huh, maybe Kotick wasn't so bad, after all."
I get the business sense behind not being on 3d party subscriptions, but his continuous panning of subscriptions while nearly all his company's revenue comes from GTA5 Online which is, basically, a backdoor subscription model, his hypocritical in the worst of ways. He doesn't mean he's against subs. He means he's running a backdoor sub for a single game and that's more profitable by far than a 3rd party catalog sub.
@cburg "We bought randy Randy!" and "Rational decisions" are two incompatible statements that do not belong in the same boardroom together.
@GuyinPA75 TBF Game Boy Color games are way, way better than most of the paint by numbers AAAAAAAAA games suits like Zelnick sell.
@Markatron84 People were definitely asking for the remaster. Specifically, shareholders.
The remaster doesn't exist because the game needs to be remastered. The remasters exist because it turns catalogue games into new releases by way of magic.
@InvaderFromSpace They put ads into Windows 11's Start Menu, ad didn't back down even with uproar. I don't give it 2 years. Microsoft wants to be Google selling ads through everything.
@Zenszulu " I would be more concerned that the person still has Christmas ornaments under their TV in August."
I mean, you'll just have to put them up again in less than a year. Why bother taking them down?
@HonestHick Sony from what we've seen is just making their own proprietary upscaling tech to rival NV/AMD. MS is doing that too, but I can guarantee you MS is going to lean HARD into pushing AI/NPU tasks on NeXtbox. Nadella already talked about Minecraft where you ask it how to build the hammer and it shows you, then it can go through your inventory and gather the ingredients etc. Basically AI playing the game for you...the future of gaming is AI driven Let's Plays according to Nadella
But MS will push AI into their hardware and into their game designs very very very hard. Because that's their corporate imperative in all things right now. Only problem is if the industry doesn't adopt that at large they're an island again, and studies show that AI is an anti-marketing term. Markets to investors, but not to consumers who are less likely to buy something if it says AI. And NeXtbox will launch years AFTER the AI hype craze ended. It'll either be revolutionary, or leave Xbox as a pariah chasing corporate's Copilot goals from 4 years back. Gotta go with the pessimism angle when talking MS
70 million? Heck even Sony's struggling to push that these days! And I think Switch 2 will be quite a drop from Switch 1's unlikely success.
That's one theme I see overall is gaming consoles as a concept are just going to be less and less broad a market. The high end shifts to PC, and the masses shift to mobile (or cheap laptops running indie games.) We talk about Xbox and console and all that but I do think the gaming landscape has radically changed, so that there's more types of games that can run on more types of devices, and less of the possible gaming market needs or wants a "box to play games on." It has a market but it's a focused, specific market. Not nearly as big as it used to be.
And I do think XB sees that and tried to get ahead of it, but its right hand and left hand couldn't agree on how to do it so they asked their left foot to try to do it, and then it got tangled, and then Amy Hood just cut it off.
@HonestHick The hurdle MS really faces is image. I'm confident they can make great hardware, they always make great hardware. Ironically it's the software that usually lets it down, bad policy, and ultimately, the Xbox brand, in the broader gaming market is just associated with "fail" at this point. The mass casuals don't know better, but they do know "PS is what everyone buys", and the Switch market won't change. How does MS change their image from the in the know gaming market from "failure"? It's going to take more than a reboot and a soft launch. They need to indicate they're a totally different organization. But the best they can seem to do is "we're kinda sorta Activision now?"
Yeah, not sure how I feel abut this. On one hand with SSD premiums even on PC, it's ridiculous the file sizes games are getting to, and it's not really practical anymore. OTOH, selling a full price $70 game that has basically no local data and must be played on the cloud, is little different than Nintendo selling games like Control as cloud streaming only. You buy it and it'll just disappear when they decide it does.
With this game I understand why it's necessary, but it also makes me reconsider buying at launch as I was considering doing knowing it's still just a rental even if you pay full price. Was going to get on PC for the pending VR rig, but already have 2020 from the summer sale.
I mean, yeah, missing most FF stuff (and other third party stuff) on XB is a huge problem, but, this isn't news of a new release skipping XB, it's a reprint of physical copies of an existing release that happened to skip Xbox. An actual XB release probably will happen eventually, I doubt it costs much to port, so hitting ANY additional audience with games that old is free money. This is the same release that was originally mobile-only and skipped even Switch for ages, inexplicably.
Comments 6,853
Re: Indiana Jones And The Great Circle Hits Xbox This December, And A PS5 Port Is Officially Coming
"It's 4 games. Not Starfield, Not Indiana Jones. Oh wait, yes, yes it is. "
Welcome to Pure Ex-Box.
Re: Xbox Begins Rolling Out 'Game Pass Standard' To Insiders For Just $1
@armondo36 Oh, nvm I thought it came with a new colored controller.
Re: Nvidia Comparison Shows How PC Ray Tracing Will Look In Xbox's Avowed
@Fiendish-Beaver Yes, Game Pass PC is just like purchasing the game on the Windows Store - no different from Steam or Epic.
Any supported RTX series card would do. Probably 2080 and up or some such.
Re: Xbox Begins Rolling Out 'Game Pass Standard' To Insiders For Just $1
@WhiteRabbit @VoidPunk They're still trying to "innovate" paying annually to use your computer.
@themightyant "Might as well be called Game Pass FO
MOEdition"You got the first two characters right.
@armondo36 Wait, I'm subscribing to Game Pass Vista.1 Professional. what's included?
Re: Nvidia Comparison Shows How PC Ray Tracing Will Look In Xbox's Avowed
@Markatron84 lol obviously! 🤣
Re: Xbox Begins Rolling Out 'Game Pass Standard' To Insiders For Just $1
Somehow, "play an unspecified selection of games at an undetermined future date, possibly, for just one dollar" doesn't roll off the tongue like the old slogan.
"Play less games, much later, for the same price you paid last year" has a better ring to it, doesn't it?
The pricing split kind of reminds me of those used listings on eBay and Amazon. You know, the one where you see
Used: Acceptable condition- may be worn and show signs of wear, missing original package, missing accessories, device is tested to function, includes base components only. $449.99. Next to the new in box one for $479.99.
Re: Nvidia Comparison Shows How PC Ray Tracing Will Look In Xbox's Avowed
Also, while watching the video I realized how convenient it is that this site is already green. As Xbox collapses and becomes a PC publisher, the site can just rebrand to PureNvidia and replace the little X-ball watermarks with swirly-eyes.
Re: Nvidia Comparison Shows How PC Ray Tracing Will Look In Xbox's Avowed
@Steel76 "I wish PS and Xbox consoles used Nvidia instead. "
Introducing PS6 and Series Y, Powered By Nvidia RTX / Starting at just $1299.99 (8GB VRAM model. Some games may require 12GB.)
Yeah, Nvidia is just plainly ahead, and it's a shame where AMD is. Not sure where they went wrong. AMD is better at raw rasterization, and always packs more VRAM (stingy Nvidia...), but way behind on RT. Their scaling isn't bad, but their drivers are always behind. Though, to be fair a lot is the same problem as "games run better on PS than XB." over 90% of GPUs on Steam are Nvidia so devs just don't optimize for AMD at all. Starfield is the one example where the game works WAY better on AMD, and kinda sucks on Nvidia. It was AMD sponsored. Dev optimization has a LOT to do with the end result, and nobody will optimize AMD unless paid to because it's less than 10% of the market.
Doesn't help that AMD just bowed out of "high end GPUs" leaving the market to Nvidia alone. No profit. They said they could cut a die that competes with 4090 no problem, but it's not cost effective.
The only problem Nvidia is going to run into though is they're committed to monolithic dies, and they've just about maxed what they can do that way. AMD is moving into chiplets. That may put them ahead in some years. The downside for consumers is AMD likes to just move their pricing up to their competitors obscene pricing the moment they're ahead (Intel, Nvidia) so they're not applying price pressure on the market.
Intel of all companies represents the sole remaining hope of sanity for the GPU market. But it may be years away.
The other problem for PS6 and XSX though is just that they're ancient. The consoles should not have launched in 2020, full stop. They're glorified 8th gen machines built on 8th gen iterations of the tech. They're Pro-X Mk II models. They were built during the NV10/NV20 era, on AMD tech, they launched the very week the NV30's launched, and the NV30's blew away everything the outdated console did on launch day, especially where RT was concerned. These consoles tech even on AMD really just predate RT as an actual usable feature.
Sony was racing to reinvigorate the "old" PS4 sales, and cut off X1X from stealing market. MS had just launched 1X and scrambled to keep up to not be left behind by Sony. The result is AMD or NVida isn't the issue, the issue is both consoles launched 2+ years before they should have and thus used tech that was 1-2 years behind what it needed to be. X1X launched holiday 2017. Then started being shelved and "Scarlett" was hyped starting winter-spring 2019. The Series X is effectively 1.5-2 years newer than the 1X. It's barely a new model. And PS6 barely a different machine.
Maybe next gen will be dramatically better, but by then a lot of us have already moved from console to PC. Not everyone will, but the more the market shrinks the less value it will represent to recoup costs.
Re: Rumour: Xbox IP Apparently Spotted In Upcoming PS5 Exclusive
Makes sense, Crash is a Naughty Dog created IP, Spyro was Insomniac, and both together are probably the most key icons of the PS1 short of the FF games and MGS. MS isn't stingy with licensing their IP. It's only by a weird twist of business fate that Sony ended up owning both companies and MS ended up owning both their IPs.
Re: Former Xbox Exec Defends Phil Spencer's Recent Decisions As Head Of Xbox
@abe_hikura That's exactly. I do favor the end of exclusives, but one company just putting their games on competing platforms while the other company withholds theirs isn't ending exclusives, it's surrendering. Nintendo and Sony aren't compatible because their hardware is so differentiated. Nintendo has a cheap handheld, Sony has an expensive miniPC. So the hardware itself segments their market. Xbox doesn't have a hardware differentiation (this gen.)
Re: Former Xbox Exec Defends Phil Spencer's Recent Decisions As Head Of Xbox
The leaders Sega's console business were "running a business."
The leaders of Lehman Brothers were "running a business"
Liz Holmes was "running a business".
Bernie Madoff was "running a business".
There's a lot of ways to "run a business."
While I have grown to doubt that Phil is running anything other than weekly contests, the question is otherwise what business is being run? They can run a successful publishing business. They can run a successful development studio. They can run an online service platform.
What I don't get about the Xbox hardware is, Microsoft is a platforms company. It's what they DO. How can the default platforms company not understand how to build and maintain successful platforms? How can they not understand their actions despite being good short term gains undermining their ability to have platform control? I get the "MS doesn't care about console" but MS does care about platforms. And how can they undervalue the power of being a dominant platform owner? Platforms is what they do!
PC was fine. Xbox=PC. PC=Xbox Pro we've known for years, and that's fine, because it's all Microsoft's ecosystem. Just caving and becoming a 3rd party console publisher makes little sense. I personally don't like exclusivity, and want it to be a relic of the past. I don't even mind all that. But they also need reasons to tell people is the ideal platform, and right now they have none other than "Game Pass".
@Markatron84 I personally do think Phil was genuine, and his vision is the one we were sold. The problem isn't so much that him being a public facing nice guy was a problem. It's that corporate removed him without removing him and decided to do things their way instead of his.
True that you always knew where you stood with Jim Ryan, but if we're down to debating dealing with a business that treats you like dirt, vs a business that was run by a guy that treats you as a customer until his superiors take over and decide to treat you as less than dirt....again, why are we even in this hobby?
I've said it before but the state of gaming is so bad I bought a Quest 3 and am actively giving money to Mark Zuckerberg as a preferred platform. That's how bad it's become.
Re: Rumour Claims Indiana Jones Will Jump From Xbox To PS5 In Early 2025
@Markatron84 Game journalism in 2024:
1: Subscribe to highly popular controversial twitter feeds.
2: Have GPT write articles based on them.
3: ???
4: Profit!
(5: Get bought by IGN)
(6: Close down.)
Re: Final Fantasy 16 Director Says He'd Like To See The Game On Xbox
@Cherip-the-Ripper It's built on a spinoff of the XIV engine which is a spinoff of Luminous. XIV runs buttery smooth. Everything else Luminous runs like hot garbage. The fps problems are weird though. Like, performance mode massively downgrades visuals until it's VERY low resolution, low textures, low LoD. But still drops into the 30s, even 20s. I'm guessing it's CPU bound and dropping the visuals doesn't help. But how does a PS5 exclusive game become CPU bound?!? And even if it targets 30fps, why would anyone design an action slasher around 30fps? With one platform? And even 30fps has terrible frame pacing so it feels more stuttery than it shoud .
@Ricky-Spanish What amazes me is this came on the heels of XV that was too ambitious and also ran horribly. It was produced by YoshiP who had to clean up the mess of the overambitious XIV and turn it into something good. Then he does the same exact thing with XVI. There's something in the water at S-E.
Re: Final Fantasy 16 Director Says He'd Like To See The Game On Xbox
@Ricky-Spanish They couldn't even get the completely exclusive PS5 version to perform well. It's harder to do for them than you might think. Lets' see how much of a trainwreck PC is first.
Re: Final Fantasy 16 Director Says He'd Like To See The Game On Xbox
Seems like pretty much a lock at their current trajectory.
Might end up double dipping on the game for PC though. I already bought and started playing up to half way through or a little beyond or so on PS5, and even bought the DLC on PS5, but now that I'm rebuilding around PC, and the game ran like chocobo dung on PS5, I think a PC version is kind of necessity for me at this point. Hopefully it doesn't run as badly as XV did. Sucks to throw away so much game progress though, not looking forward to redoing a few of those fights. It's a pretty good game. A horrible Final Fantasy game, but if you close your eyes, pretend it's not called XVI, and pretend it's a spinoff sequel of Stranger of Paradise, it's pretty good.
Re: Talking Point: What Improvements Would You Like To See Made To The Xbox Store?
@HarmanSmith TBF Satya has a more robust collection of promises on AI than number of Windows licenses sold since 1990.
Yeah, I honestly don't know how they're pushing so hard on PC while running a store that makes EA Origin look like the future. How does one launch a PC gaming store that's missing most games?! It's the default pack-in store in Windows. You'd think it would be robust. Instead it's a vacuum. Hard to take the store seriously unless playing a game you already bought on XB and it happens to be on there.
I suspect the list of Play Anywhere titles is shorter than the list of BC titles. Which is sad. I have a huge XB library and my automatic PC library is barely one page from that.
Re: Skyrim's Massive 'Skyblivion' Mod Looks Incredible, But It's Apparently Too Big For Xbox
@InterceptorAlpha Oh man, I didn't even know there WAS a Morrowind VR mod!
Does it support the mess of mods to pretty it up, and also the coop mods?
I know Skyrim takes like 100+ mods (and effectively requires a paid Nexus sub just to efficiently download them all) to make it totally pretty plus have adequate VR control/detection, and doesn't support the coop mod at all. If I could get Morrowind (and/or oblivion) with beautifying mods, that would be amazing.
Re: Skyrim's Massive 'Skyblivion' Mod Looks Incredible, But It's Apparently Too Big For Xbox
I know Bethesda isn't Rockstar, but, these guys are literally promising to take Bethesda licenced content from a different game and put it in their mod, and I doubt Bethesda (or Amy Hood) are fond of someone distributing free copies of Oblivion with every Skyrim purchase.
If it really happened it would be my dream - especially if it works with Skyrim VR, but, I can not imagine the Bethesda/MS lawyers sleeping on "We're duplicating Oblivion and distributing for free."
Re: Former Xbox Boss Reveals How Apple Watch Played 'Big Role' In Saving His Life
I see Peter still reads Xbox news. Yeah. It has that effect.
@TheSimulator With Microsoft's history of being able to count by adding 1 to a number (95-96, 98, 2000, 7, 8, 8.1, 10, 11) do you really want them to be your timepiece?
"I have a meeting at 12:30, what time is it? Oh, it's 11:49, I've still got time left."
Checks time 30 minutes later:
"OMG it's 11:79!"
Re: Talking Point: What Improvements Would You Like To See Made To The Xbox Store?
Often, when I'm browsing the store, I tend to forget about Game Pass, and I'm never sure when I'm looking at a game if I have to buy it or if I can play it and hundreds of other games on Game Pass. It might help if they could put more information up reminding people that Game Pass exists and that you can play games on Game Pass, or that a game is available on Game Pass or can be played instantly on the cloud with Game Pass.
Seriously though the only thing I think the store really needs is to bring back the feature they took away when series luanched which is being able to shop in the mobile app. PS lets me shop in the mobile app. Steam lets me shop in the mobile app. Other 3rd parties let me shop in the mobile app. Nintendo...well they're Nintendo. Xbox let you shop in the mobile app first, and then mysteriously disposed of it right when PS finally started supporting it.
Also, the Windows Store on PC. It needs games. Seriously, just, like any games. At all. Why does it have no games?
Re: New Info About 'Hi-Fi RUSH' Dev Tango Gameworks Acquisition
This has got to be the weirdest acquisition we've ever seen. Other than maybe THQ is there any other case in which a dead studio was purchased after it was dead? And why would MS close a studio if they're going to shop to sell it after they close it? Isn't that like eating the pizza and then trying to sell it?
Re: Xbox Store Wishlists Will Soon Appear On Your Console Home Screen
@GuyinPA75 Phil did talk about multiple storefronts. Maybe that's next. Make purchases on PSN Store directly from your Xbox!
@Jenkinss Could be worse. The Win11 is hitting win+G every time you go into an HDR/non-HDR game and need to toggle HDR. Even if you're using controller.....
Re: Xbox Insider Insists Forza Horizon 5 Will Go Multiplatform At Some Point
MS really needs to decide, even if it's just a marketing thing, what is the selling point of their console. They're selling it. They need to explain why people should want to buy it. "It's the same price as competitors and plays a subset of the same games nearly as well" isn't a good selling point. They tried to make it Game Pass, but only a subset of console buyers buy game pass and many of them buy only because of mandatory online.
No exclusives is fine. IT's what they wanted for Xbox One, too. That's fine. But what is the unique proposition of Xbox? That's what they're not communicating (or including.)
Re: Xbox Store Wishlists Will Soon Appear On Your Console Home Screen
While they do this can they also remove emailing me every time a "game on my wishlist is on sale" 2 years after I already purchased it?
Re: Rumour: Xbox To Announce 'Big' Game For PS5 Next Week
@Jenkinss You expect future Bungie projects? O_O
@Sol4ris In a vacuum, I agree. Where people get upset by it is inevitably it leads to attrition of the platform install base which inevitably leads to the company closing it due to low sales. Everyone here is financially invested in the long term prospects of the platform so every move that moves to damage the platform and its long term success is a damaging act to the financial stakeholders, (stakeholders, not shareholders), which would be everyone here.
Re: Rumour: Xbox To Announce 'Big' Game For PS5 Next Week
Not sure if they're just going to go and do it and do Indiana Jones or Starfield or Forza Horizon (already one of the most played games on Steam so it's logical), or if they're going to spend 2 weeks letting the internet say it is without correcting it, only to later announce it's Blinx.
Re: Xbox Adds New Feature For Handheld PCs That 'Really Improves The Experience'
That's cool and all, but this stuff only works for Xbox/Windows Store games. Which would be great, if, y'know, the Windows Store actually had games beyond what's on Game Pass.
Re: Fallout: New Vegas Director Says He'd Work On More Fallout For Xbox Without 'Constraints'
I, also, would like for someone that actually understands the Fallout universe to make Fallout games again.
Re: Indiana Jones Xbox Release Date Likely To Be Revealed Next Week
Pick a number between 24 and 26!
Re: Splitgate Fans Worried Sequel Has Lost Its 'Soul' Following Initial Reveal
@Steel76 You got me curious enough to watch but I didn't find anything "hello, boomer" about it. It's just competitive shooter lingo, and super toned down as a PR piece video. Actually it seems like it hasn't changed from the 90's.
Now MMO lingo....that is a whole pot of confusion right there. That's less "hello, boomer" and more "hey neeeeeeeeeerdd." It took a month of googling just to figure out WTF all the acronyms were about from the guides trying to help when starting XIV!
Re: Random: Xbox Fan Discovers Their '$13K' Copy Of Halo Is Only Worth $25
@Fiendish-Beaver You're worse than me! From 360 I think I have only those two. I have a few PS4 games unopened. I do have the Persona 4 Take Your Heart Edition sealed and unopened, that's probably worth money, but nobody will ever pry my Morgana plushie from my cold dead hands. I have the steelbook FFXV sealed (the one with the movie you need to watch to understand the plot but without half the game in it.) Ni No Kuni II steelbook. I have some 3DS games unopened. MK7, a few more uncommon ones.
All tolled I probably have a good month of game pass at 2025 pricing in unopened games.
Re: Random: Xbox Fan Discovers Their '$13K' Copy Of Halo Is Only Worth $25
Also, I have an actual sealed unopened copy of Reach. And Fable 3. I accept cash and money orders.
Re: Random: Xbox Fan Discovers Their '$13K' Copy Of Halo Is Only Worth $25
Someone needs to explain to the appraisers that all copies sold by Game Stop in the US would have been unsealed before purchase, so an unsealed case, with a disc with fingerprints on it that was re-buffed and "used only by employees" indeed does count as mint-unopened, according to GameStop, and thus should sell for the full $25,000.
Re: Xbox's Hi-Fi RUSH Studio Tango Gameworks Revived, Acquired By PUBG Publisher
@LX_FENIX Or better yet, when they pay to get HiFi Rush 2 as a Game Pass Day 1 launch title and dump a bunch of cash into it. Because you know they will. It was Game Pass's biggest game, don't you know! THAT would the most Microsoft Microsoft decision possible.
Re: Xbox's Hi-Fi RUSH Studio Tango Gameworks Revived, Acquired By PUBG Publisher
@Zenszulu Even that doesn't make sense because if they were selling the studio, that means including the talent, and if they shut them down while secretly planning to sell, by the time the buyer would get to the table the talent and therefore studio would be gone. And based on the filings, only Hifi Rush was included, not Evil Within or Ghostwire, so MS kept those (or so it seems.) Why tell the studio you're closing them, but keep paying them, then secretly out of nowhere announce you sold the studio and IP? Why not just find a buyer and then announce you sold the studio and avoid the massive PR fail?
The whole thing is weird. My gut feeling is that it's still part of the internal war going on. Corporate probably said to shut it down so they announced they're shutting it down. Then, remember Phil's answer during the SGF IGN interview about this: " I haven't been talking publicly about this, because right now is a time for us to focus on the team and the individuals. It's obviously a decision that's very hard on them and I want to make sure through severance and other things that we're doing the right thing for the individuals on the team. It's not about my PR, it's not about Xbox PR, it's about those teams."
At the time the quote seemed like weirdly out of character corporate babble. Now in hindsight it seems like he was keeping quiet while shopping buyers and that quote was an endrun around that. I get the sense he was hiding that effort from corporate more than from the audience.
Obviously SOMEONE had to be shopping a buyer because it doesn't pop up out of nowhere months later with an IP transfer after the studio heads have already lamented the closure publicly.
It's another feather in the "weird Xbox decisions" cap for sure, and probably another outward display of the raging internal war in the organization. Now we have guerilla warfare with internal organizations and owned IP!
Re: Xbox Series X|S Sales 'Holding Close' To Xbox 360 In The US, Says Analyst
That's surprising. It's relatively good news that the core market shows strength for the brand, that's something they can use to rebound elsewhere, but it's kind of hard to picture Series selling as well as 360 where in the US the 360 felt like a marketing phenomenon that was everywhere and Series, well, doesn't.
Re: Xbox's Hi-Fi RUSH Studio Tango Gameworks Revived, Acquired By PUBG Publisher
That's awesome, and also the most bizarre thing that I've seen in a while. So MS buys them with Zeni, then has a hit with them, then shuts them down when they want to make a sequel, then, months later.....we hear reports that they've SOLD them?! How did they close them and then sell them? After the staff already scrambled and presumably left?! And they sell the HiFI Rush IP, the hit IP that did so much for them so they said with it? And Bethesda is on board in transitioning the sale....
I'm happy Tango's not dead (assuming anyone was still left at Tango after they were told they were closing?), but what just happened?
I'll be fair to Phil, I assume this is what he meant by being quiet about it to make sure to do what's best for the employees etc...apparently they were finding a buyer for their announced closed studio. But it's still just so weird. Why not just sell the studio instead of announcing they're closing it then announcing they sold it? Once again I imagine an internal conflict with the head eating the tail again.
Re: Xbox Attracts Controversy Over New McDonald's Ad On The Dashboard
@Mustoe I disagree. The framing of your original post is that xbox is the bad choice, the really bad choice, the only logical way to read it is that the other choice(s) of consoles are much better.
There's arguments to be made for which one is the better/worse purchase, and there's plenty to say about what's wrong with Xbox, but the implication of that original post is that people would be much better off with a PS or Switch than an Xbox, and for a variety of reasons with those two that's also not automatically true.
In reality the state of consoles, and more accurately everything to do with gaming is heading down a deep, dark hole, maybe since the rice of mobile gamblegaming, and we'd all really be better off knitting.
Re: Xbox Attracts Controversy Over New McDonald's Ad On The Dashboard
@Mustoe again I agree, and we agree they're both just as bad, but I think the impression of coming on an Xbox site to badmouth Xbox exclusively creates the impression of console warring in favor of other brands when those brands are in fact also bad. Is not about defending Xbox because others are bad it's about not creating the image that others are good because Xbox is bad. "Xbox bad" instantly reads to most as "ps better".
Re: Take-Two CEO Says 'Rational Decisions' Result In No Day One Xbox Game Pass Releases
@GuyinPA75 Yeah, at the old price I found some value in it. Little gems like little kitty big city I would've have never tried were nice to find. But at the new price I'll cancel. The big Microsoft games will cost about the same if I wait for sales, and heading PC,I probably won't even get it for PC. Way cheaper but again steam and 3rd pay keys mean I'll break even at best but own it, and I'm not playing all the indies much with a huge backlog of bigger games while my indies come mostly down to VR and even meta has an old Gold like sub for $60 a year for that. For me the gp math doesn't add up anymore. It might for PC, but then might as well do sales
Re: Xbox Attracts Controversy Over New McDonald's Ad On The Dashboard
@Mustoe True to a point but also talking about one in a vacuum like that's the bad one and the others are good ones misses a lot of context
Re: Xbox Attracts Controversy Over New McDonald's Ad On The Dashboard
@Mustoe I half agree, except when the console alternative is PayStation: For the Payers, feels like kind of a magic coin toss for the biggest tossers really.
There's PC, of course, but then we're the biggest losers. Jensen needs a new $5m leather jacket made of gamer centipede.
Re: Take-Two CEO Says 'Rational Decisions' Result In No Day One Xbox Game Pass Releases
"Rational decisions." BRB, gonna head to a mirror store to pick up Zel's Christmas gift.
Zelnick is the only executive in gaming that actually makes me think "Huh, maybe Kotick wasn't so bad, after all."
I get the business sense behind not being on 3d party subscriptions, but his continuous panning of subscriptions while nearly all his company's revenue comes from GTA5 Online which is, basically, a backdoor subscription model, his hypocritical in the worst of ways. He doesn't mean he's against subs. He means he's running a backdoor sub for a single game and that's more profitable by far than a 3rd party catalog sub.
@cburg "We bought randy Randy!" and "Rational decisions" are two incompatible statements that do not belong in the same boardroom together.
@GuyinPA75 TBF Game Boy Color games are way, way better than most of the paint by numbers AAAAAAAAA games suits like Zelnick sell.
Re: SEGA Confirms Partial Delisting For OG Sonic Generations On Xbox
@Markatron84 People were definitely asking for the remaster. Specifically, shareholders.
The remaster doesn't exist because the game needs to be remastered. The remasters exist because it turns catalogue games into new releases by way of magic.
Re: Xbox Attracts Controversy Over New McDonald's Ad On The Dashboard
@InvaderFromSpace They put ads into Windows 11's Start Menu, ad didn't back down even with uproar. I don't give it 2 years. Microsoft wants to be Google selling ads through everything.
@Zenszulu " I would be more concerned that the person still has Christmas ornaments under their TV in August."
I mean, you'll just have to put them up again in less than a year. Why bother taking them down?
Re: Microsoft Hiring Engineers To 'Define The Future Of Graphics' On Xbox
@HonestHick Sony from what we've seen is just making their own proprietary upscaling tech to rival NV/AMD. MS is doing that too, but I can guarantee you MS is going to lean HARD into pushing AI/NPU tasks on NeXtbox. Nadella already talked about Minecraft where you ask it how to build the hammer and it shows you, then it can go through your inventory and gather the ingredients etc. Basically AI playing the game for you...the future of gaming is AI driven Let's Plays according to Nadella
But MS will push AI into their hardware and into their game designs very very very hard. Because that's their corporate imperative in all things right now. Only problem is if the industry doesn't adopt that at large they're an island again, and studies show that AI is an anti-marketing term. Markets to investors, but not to consumers who are less likely to buy something if it says AI. And NeXtbox will launch years AFTER the AI hype craze ended. It'll either be revolutionary, or leave Xbox as a pariah chasing corporate's Copilot goals from 4 years back. Gotta go with the pessimism angle when talking MS
70 million? Heck even Sony's struggling to push that these days! And I think Switch 2 will be quite a drop from Switch 1's unlikely success.
That's one theme I see overall is gaming consoles as a concept are just going to be less and less broad a market. The high end shifts to PC, and the masses shift to mobile (or cheap laptops running indie games.) We talk about Xbox and console and all that but I do think the gaming landscape has radically changed, so that there's more types of games that can run on more types of devices, and less of the possible gaming market needs or wants a "box to play games on." It has a market but it's a focused, specific market. Not nearly as big as it used to be.
And I do think XB sees that and tried to get ahead of it, but its right hand and left hand couldn't agree on how to do it so they asked their left foot to try to do it, and then it got tangled, and then Amy Hood just cut it off.
Re: Rumour: Xbox Handheld System Will Sit Alongside 'A Series X Successor'
@HonestHick The hurdle MS really faces is image. I'm confident they can make great hardware, they always make great hardware. Ironically it's the software that usually lets it down, bad policy, and ultimately, the Xbox brand, in the broader gaming market is just associated with "fail" at this point. The mass casuals don't know better, but they do know "PS is what everyone buys", and the Switch market won't change. How does MS change their image from the in the know gaming market from "failure"? It's going to take more than a reboot and a soft launch. They need to indicate they're a totally different organization. But the best they can seem to do is "we're kinda sorta Activision now?"
Re: Review: Kena: Bridge Of Spirits (Xbox) - Slick Combat & Cute Companions Smooth Over Some Rough Spots
Pixar Souls FTW!
Re: Microsoft Flight Sim 2024 Allows You To 'Exit The Plane' And Walk Around
Yeah, not sure how I feel abut this. On one hand with SSD premiums even on PC, it's ridiculous the file sizes games are getting to, and it's not really practical anymore. OTOH, selling a full price $70 game that has basically no local data and must be played on the cloud, is little different than Nintendo selling games like Control as cloud streaming only. You buy it and it'll just disappear when they decide it does.
With this game I understand why it's necessary, but it also makes me reconsider buying at launch as I was considering doing knowing it's still just a rental even if you pay full price. Was going to get on PC for the pending VR rig, but already have 2020 from the summer sale.
Re: Square Enix's Final Fantasy I-VI Collection Returns This October, But Still Not For Xbox
I mean, yeah, missing most FF stuff (and other third party stuff) on XB is a huge problem, but, this isn't news of a new release skipping XB, it's a reprint of physical copies of an existing release that happened to skip Xbox. An actual XB release probably will happen eventually, I doubt it costs much to port, so hitting ANY additional audience with games that old is free money. This is the same release that was originally mobile-only and skipped even Switch for ages, inexplicably.
Maybe it'll be on the xbox mobile store lol.