740°

Redfall Mock Internal Reviews Rated It "Double Digits" Higher, Says Phil Spencer

Xbox boss Phil Spencer has admitted that Redfall reviews have been "double digits" below what the title scored in mock internal reviews.

Vengeance1138394d ago

Jeeeeesus, so internally they have little idea of what true quality should look and feel like? That speaks volumes and is genuinely scary.

SullysCigar394d ago

This is what denial looks like, It sounds like a mother bragging about how good looking her son is - definitely no bias there lol

How can they be so far removed from reality that they don't understand why these review scores are so low? And why not just outright tell us what your scores were, rather than hinting at it and sounding sour? It's time for transparency, not more double-speak, Phil!

We'd better hope that the MS internal reviewers are rating Starfield at about 130/100, because otherwise they're in trouble. Again.

potatoseal394d ago

It could also mean that internally, the people that are making these higher scoring mock reviews, are complete sycophants. Yes men that are afraid the throw a wrench into the positive momentum they might have had going behind the scenes. No one to shine a light on the cold hard truths of the situation.

VenomUK394d ago (Edited 394d ago )

Near the end of the interview when Phil Spencer is asked about whether Xbox is not focusing on the boxed console because of PC Phil Spencer goes on to discuss the cloud vision - THIS is the reason the CMA rejected the Microsoft buyout of ABK.

Here is the section (very slight edits) at 34:58m in the video. When you watch Phil Spencer speak he definitely is agitated by that and the video better conveys how he is saying we are not just about console but Cloud.

Kinda Scummy: “When you see the community talk about the console-side of things do you think you’ve lost the focus on maybe put too much time into the PC side, do you think that the console is still getting the console love that it deserves? Do you think you guys have lost that focus or is it still there?”

Phil Spencer: “we’’ll definitely continue to focus on making our console experience as great as it can be… I will say, this may be disruptive as well, we have a DIFFERENT VISION. Play the games you want, with the people you want, anywhere you want. We want Xbox to be something that people who buy our console can be a member of, people who are playing on PC and who are playing on CLOUD, feel like they’re full members of our ecosystem. Game Pass players can players can play on many different devices and we remain fully committed to that. We’re not in the business of out-consoling Sony, or out-consoling Nintendo."

https://www.youtube.com/wat...

darthv72394d ago

Spencer Speaks: Episode 29, The Redfall Fiasco

-Foxtrot394d ago

Phil literally needs to be fired at this point, the whole Xbox team needs a fresh clean slate

EazyC394d ago

There should be an internal inquiry about that process. The people involved were either incompetent, disingenuous and/or outright sycophants.

I am reminded of a process I have in my workplace where I must submit feedback for colleagues after a client job. Broadly speaking, it IS far easier just to give a cursory positive review, as giving criticism in any capacity has a multitude of potential knock-on effects.

+ Show (2) more repliesLast reply 394d ago
solideagle394d ago

it's like Politicians thinking that they will win for sure, when asks why "I am feeling it and the whole party feels it" :D

No disrespect to the hardworking devs/QA/Analysts/designer... I think it all comes to management (the ultimate decision makers)?

RpgSama394d ago

Double digits higher?

So in the 50s? LOL

ElendilsSorrow394d ago

Icing on the cake at this point, complete and utter failure of a release.

Crows90394d ago

Maybe the head of Xbox should try out these games himself. I like to think that it he does since he claims to always play these games and yet still releases games that are either unfinished, crappy looking or just bad. He doesn't have the passion for gaming or the understanding of quality. That is the problem.

Chevalier394d ago

Jeez so their own internal review group is just as disconnected from reality as much as their crazy fans.

EazyC394d ago

I think this just illustrates how detached the videogame development landscape is from the reality of how videogames are perceived. The industry is seemingly run entirely by people who do not give a flying fuck about videogames as an art form and just see it as a product to be milked to death. Now you can say "duh", but to me this model is unsustainable. I feel like the entire medium has been eroded over the last 5 years by this complete indifference big budget development projects have; no vision, no passion....it cannot work in the long run.

This disconnect is allowed to continue however because of 1) subscription models like Game Pass, where any old slop can "look" like its doing well, and 2) monetisation models in games distorting the revenue output (a lower proportion of gamers contribute heavily to overall revenue by engaging in mtx).

I would LOVE to sit down with these supposed internal reviewers and find out what their gaming experience/history is.

FinalFantasyFanatic393d ago

I can honestly see another video game crash coming in the future, especially if they somehow double their output (unfortunately I suspect AI will allow them to do this). Not hard to see when so many developers are pushing out unfinished or bland/uninspiring games in the past few years.

badz149393d ago

so...Phil, now you know who to fire before you step down yourself, right?

DarXyde393d ago

If we take his statements at face value, sure. I don't know that you should though.

The only way I can see this being true is if reviewers were asked to rate it on specific, predetermined indicators that possibly omitted performance issues.

Or, if we take a very simple interpretation: this is just false and it's a case of a publisher having a deadline and it was pushed out to meet it.

In my view, no one should revisit this game when the "updates roll out". If you do, you're really just showing them that it's okay. This entire situation feels like a stress test of the "drop now, fix later" mentality. Question is, how much are people willing to forgive?

Godmars290393d ago

Boy, its almost like after - What? three Crackdown titles - that its only been true about Xbox being tone deft towards making games.

roadkillers393d ago

Never knew there was a vote up limit. This is the first time I've seen 100 thumbs up

lucian229393d ago

At this point anyone who buys an Xbox is an idiot..... Especially if their next console.

FinalFantasyFanatic393d ago

You would think they would have some professional QA testers, surely, I can't imagine it would be hard to hire some gamers to play test these things. At this point, it might be worth while doing some early access games and getting feedback before they get too far in development to course correct.

yeahokwhatever390d ago

culture of ignoring QA. Respect your QA team. listen to them. roll in the dough.

+ Show (10) more repliesLast reply 390d ago
-Mika-394d ago

Very interesting. A lot of good questions were asked. The internal review team at Xbox needs to be reevaluated. Im not sure how this game tested positively internally. Im glad to see Engineers from The Coalition, Rare and more came in to help the moment they learned about the 60 FPS issues. This shows how connected Xbox studios is and this is a really good sign for the future. Phil also said the Roadmap is coming together, games are coming every quarter and I believe him. I think going forward, the Xbox is going to be good. I don't think we ever going to have a Redfall situation again.

SullysCigar394d ago

Yeah, we dared to hope the same after Crackdown 3. And Bleeding Edge. Yet here we are...

Chevalier394d ago (Edited 394d ago )

How was this supposed to have launched 6 months ago? If they knew it needed additional time you would think that's when you would take stock and do a quality review to ACTUALLY decide will this be good to release in 6 months. If no then is it 9 months or a year they need?

How the hell did they go hey this game needs more time and decide they only needed 6 months and it would be ready? Like is there a spinning wheeling that decided how much time was given to fix this? Did throw a dart on a dart board and go looks like you got 6 months? How come they didn't get other studios to help out?

VenomUK393d ago

Who did the mock reviews Destin Legare and Colt Eastwood?

crazyCoconuts394d ago

How long has it been since the last AAA Xbox exclusive? How many has Xbox had in this generation?
Given the OBVIOUS lack of exclusives so far, it's PAINFULLY obvious how important to the Xbox brand each and everyone one of these is to the brand.
For Phil (who claims to be a gamer) to not have spend enough time with this game to miscalculate so wildly how poorly Redfall would be received?
He's either:
a) totally lying -or-
b) completely incompetent

Chevalier394d ago

"He's either:
a) totally lying -or-
b) completely incompetent"

Not mutually exclusive. Can be both.

isarai394d ago

They literally say the same thing about every flop, recore, crackdown 3, halo 5, halo infinite, bleeding edge, etc etc

EazyC394d ago (Edited 394d ago )

Jesus, kinda forgot about those. Microsoft is absolutely in the shitter. I think it won't be until the next big stock market crash that we'll see any real change up, their Game Pass service will keep them on life support until then imo.

excaliburps394d ago

Yep. It's an MS issue if this is deemed high quality. You don't need to be a game critic to know that it had serious flaws.

jznrpg394d ago (Edited 394d ago )

He’s full of crap or people are too scared to tell the truth and have to be yes men/women. I think it’s probably both but Phil is very full and spewing out some

crazyCoconuts394d ago

I think it's likely that yes, he was lying. I mean, look at all the armchair analysis that was going on with the IGN videos - folks knew the trainwreck was coming - of course Phil knew.
As he alluded to in the video - would 3 more months change things dramatically? Does it even matter if it gets rated poorly in the grand scheme of things? I think he just folded on RedFail

Markusb33394d ago

damn you sound just a delusional as Phil, the only time xbox was good was when Don ran the show, Halo was a system seller that people moved their games away from as it sold like crazy, and look what they did to it.
The lies about high fidelity vr, standard 60fps or even 120fps, xbox series eats monsters for breakast and yet ghostwire and many multiplats run better on a lower spec ps5 ? Come on they have more studios than anyone, more money but cant compete or release a game that runs and looks as good a Ghost of Tsushuma from last gen.
Enjoy what you want but dont get on the endless waiting train.

yeahokwhatever390d ago

PS5 isn't lower spec. Your misunderstandings of hardware is setting up your expectations to be let down.

Seafort393d ago

It was full of "yes men" and they didn't want to annoy their boss so they blew smoke up his backside instead.

No wonder MS was shocked at the real world reviews from critics and customers. They were still in their little circle jerk bubble thinking Redfall was the bees knees when it was everything but.

+ Show (4) more repliesLast reply 390d ago
edwardmde394d ago

There is literally zero reason for a gamer wanting MS to snap up more devs. Like turkeys voting for Christmas.

EazyC394d ago

Appalling....I mean, even if its true, Spencer should have kept his mouth shut. It truly makes MS look delusional and out of touch.

italiangamer394d ago

Well if your mock reviewer is Ray Charles I can see how this could happen.

GamingSinceForever394d ago

Respect the dead. Don’t drag him into this fooishness. Lo!

Outside_ofthe_Box394d ago

Lol Phil needs to stop doing interviews. There was no need to reveal this information.

EazyC394d ago

Yeah, it's all well and good putting your hands up and admitting failure, but if you repeatedly make those same mistake you should probably stfu and leave the reflection piece to when you've actually decided to DO something about it.

Show all comments (101)
320°

Trying to push players over from PC to console is a terrible idea, PlayStation

As PlayStation announces its new strategy to encourage PC users to choose PS5 it is a bitter-sweet moment for PC gamers.

Christopher1d 6h ago

I mean, it's a business based on hardware market. Do we expect them to not even try? It's not like Nintendo doesn't do the same by not putting any games on PC and Microsoft until recently did the same. I don't care what they attempt, as long as they don't abuse the community or lie about their goals/requirements.

Will it work? Not likely. Should we care? No. Let them waste their time, it doesn't affect anything.

RaidenBlack1d 6h ago

let them try ... at the end of the day, we get few extra PC games ... yay ... and also promotes game preservation via PC ... so double yay.

LordoftheCritics13h ago

If only Playstation games provided the ease of pc gaming features.

Primary being very few PS games support m/kb.

Christopher6h ago

If only PC games supported controllers more. Main reason I play primarily on console. So many games have shit support on PC. Playing Dark Envoy now, and it's quite frustrating since I have to switch to keyboard during cut scenes just to make sure advancing conversation doesn't also auto-select a decision. Let alone it's quite rough to select between characters and inventory screens are bad bad bad.

Anywho, similar complaints for both I find. But, I 100% agree that both PC and consoles should support both as best as possible.

crazyCoconuts1h ago

PS may push more kb support in the future to get more PC converts, we'll see.

Flewid6387m ago

As someone with a high end PC, I feel like the ease is on PS5. Too many PC games are a troubleshooting nightmare, which few people have the time for when all you want to do is pop in a game & play it.

LordoftheCritics4h ago(Edited 4h ago)

I don't think you understand what I mean by the lack of m/kb support on PS.

Over a thousand titles have PS controller support on PC.

Not even 30 titles have m/kb support on PS5.

Once you are done with the single player title, you'll go back to playing your daily shooter/looter/mmo etc which the pc gamer has mastered with their mouse and keyboard.
Why would any pc gamer make the switch?

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 7m ago
Fishy Fingers1d 5h ago (Edited 1d 5h ago )

I wish them the best of luck.

But PC players are often a patient bunch, many will even wait for Epic launcher exclusivity to end until a game comes to Steam.

If they didnt buy the console when its games were exclusive, why would they do it now theyre not?

MrNinosan15h ago

Way more do than you probably think.

ravens5215h ago

All you need is that one game that'll make a few switch at a time. Like a game a PC player REALLY wants.

porkChop2h ago

It just doesn't work that way though. Plenty of the best games ever made were never available on PC. That didn't make PC gamers buy consoles to play them. This kind of strategy has never worked in the past and it won't work now. It's fine for PS to hold their games back and release on PC later, but to think that will boost console sales is wishful thinking. All this will accomplish is some double dipping, which is obviously good for business.

JackBNimble2h ago(Edited 1h ago)

People aren't going to switch from pc to ps5, why would anyone do that for a game?
Most sony exclusives aren't all that to begin with, and pc has the option to upgrade what they want when they want it. Having access to some ps5 games, gamepass and steam.

Thinking this would happen is naive

outsider162411h ago

I mean if there's 10 million pc gamers out there...getting atleast just 1 million from there is probably a good thing..right?

romulus238h ago

PC players are not a monolith, I don't know why people keep thinking they speak for the entirety of all PC gamers like they all know each other personally. You think out of the millions of PC gamers not one single person will be impatient?Well Sony is willing to bet there will be. Why would they do it now? People's feelings change and new PC gamers come along all the time that may also feel different about waiting, that's why.

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 2h ago
-Foxtrot1d 5h ago

PC gamers are just too patient and loyal to their gaming set ups, something they've spent a lot of money on to perfect. They have backlogs of games which many never get round to finishing or get round to at all and will always have other multiplatform releases to keep them going.

Over the many years Sony has published so many awesome titles such as The Last of Us, Uncharted, Heavenly Sword, Infamous, Killzone, LittleBigPlanet, Dreams, Puppeteer, Resistance, Heavy Rain, Gran Turismo, Motor Storm, God of War, Horizon, Ratchet and Clank, Spiderman, Ghost of Tsushima, Bloodborne

If none of those games BEFORE all these PC ports convinced a hardcore PC gamer to get a PS5 console then why on Earth would porting them them to PC now make any difference? All PC gamers now know 100% is that they just have to be patient, which they are good at anyway to get a PS5 game 2 years later.

I get GaaS games or multiplayer focused titles but if people really want to play these games they'd have gotten a PS console years ago.

Crows9011h ago

Not sure they're aiming to convince the hardcore PC gamer.

Not sure why people are obsessing over his comment...it seems pretty simple to me.

He will do all he can to entice gamers to move to his ecosystem. As you say....exclusives existing hasn't moved many gamers over. But if they get to try them and love the games then they might change their mind about waiting 2 years.

We're in an echo chamber on this site...I've Personally seen people with Xbox and PC setups but no PlayStation. I've also seen people with small PC setups but no console. Not every pc gamer invests thousands and many may decide to put one in the living room.

They're not looking to convince all of players to buy a PlayStation...just a few...and really it is just a PR statement after all...they have to give a reason why single player won't release day 1....not to mention they also have to ensure current PlayStation gamers don't jump ship to PC. It goes both ways and they're ignoring the big L by putting any of their games off their platform.

anast10h ago

"Not sure they're aiming to convince the hardcore PC gamer."

Right here

Kakashi Hatake11h ago

PC gamers think tomorrow is promised. Sorry, don't have time for that.

Michiel198910h ago

it's not just about loyalty or sunk cost, pc is an open platform while consoles are closed platforms. If you for example want to mod, you will play on pc, no question about it. Also if you like indie games, steam is a fucking goldmine for that. I've been playing a lot of indie games over the last years and there just seems to be an endless amount of them on steam. Also not having games locked to a certain fps is a prettty big deal for me and I assume a lot of other pc players.

Walalon8h ago

And don't forget steam sales, you can get a ton of games on an awesome price.

badz14922m ago

@Walalon

Sony has been doing sales constantly on the PS Store nowadays.

romulus238h ago

And how do you know out of the millions of PC gamers that not one single person ever went ahead and bought a PlayStation console for one or more of those games? People keep speaking for the entirety of millions of PC gamers like they know them all personally. Here's one example for you, I'm currently typing on a recently purchased PC that cost me over twenty five hundred dollars and is more than capable of running any game including Sony exclusives that come to PC and yet I still bought a PS5 so apparently I'm not patient or loyal enough to my set up, hope it's not mad at me for not being loyal.

+ Show (2) more repliesLast reply 22m ago
helicoptergirl1d 4h ago

Who cares? Then just stay on PC and play the waiting game. No big deal. Sony wins in the end anyway.

Number1TailzFan1d 4h ago

I mean if there's any single player Sony games that I actually want that aren't on PC then I would buy said console to play them on. But the ones that I like that aren't on PC are few and far between anyway so no loss for me.

If I game, it's usually multiplayer titles, otherwise I like playing around with some other software.

Amplitude6h ago(Edited 6h ago)

Astro Bot is the game that just did it for me. I'm gonna have to grab a PS5 again for that.

I did this for Ratchet Rift Apart too but ended up selling the PS5 after getting my plat. Rebought it on PC and other than GoW Ragnarok and Horizon FW (which eventually I could get anyway), I haven't had a reason to downgrade my graphics, controller features, ease of recording, and increase my game costs and monthly subscriptions throughout this entire generation.

I play on a TV with a controller but this has been the absolute worst console gen for both consoles. Never in my life thought I'd be a PC gamer but I've been spoiled by the cheap costs, cross-platform controllers and mostly the unbelievably useful Steam controller config.

Show all comments (60)
100°

Redfall's final update, which adds an Offline Mode, is available and it's 16GB in size

Arkane Austin has just released Game Update 4, the final patch for Redfall which is 16GB in size and adds an Offline Mode.

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PassNextquestion2d ago

I'm not interested in this game but i think it's great they added the offline mode for those who are.

darthv721d 1h ago

It was okay at first... once they added the performance update it was definitely better.

TwoPicklesGood1d 18h ago

Bury this turd. It’s only good as a reminder of what devs shouldn’t do.

mkis0071d 2h ago

I hate the concept of an announced final update.

50°

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