Microsoft has found out, in a really rather painful way, that nothing remains a secret for long. In the day and age of mobile-phone cameras and anonymity on the internet, it only takes one person to spill the beans on a forum for ‘Top Secret’ to turn into ‘Common Knowledge’.
Before you know it, the world knows it. Dev-kits codenamed Durango, ‘always-on’ requirements, not able to play second-hand games. The amount of rumours for Microsoft’s new console grows by the day, and I’m finding it hard to keep up with. Yet, the one thing that’s easy to track is Microsoft’s stance on the whole thing. “No comment.”
In years past, where careful planning and preparation for an announcement meant something, this was all well and good.
In previous console cycles you’d have to announce your product to everyone at big events to guarantee blanket coverage. Got a game to show? Save it for E3 because then you know people will be paying attention. New console? Well, that’ll have to be shown at Tokyo Game Show, doing it any other time would just be messy.
By putting Black Ops 6 on Game Pass, Microsoft plans to gauge its growth, pricing, and monetization changes, at the cost of less game sales.
If they have follow up games that are bangers, then this strategy will work. But if it’s Call of Duty followed another dead period then it won’t last.
When the game does not hit 1 Billion in revenue in under two weeks they will wonder why and the next thing you know; Season Updates will no longer be free.
subscribers go up, execs celebrate win, get bonus, price goes up, subscribers go down,
execs dont care, got their bonus,
The Xbox brand has done a lot of good over the years, but their various blunders are pretty wild to look back on in their magnitude.
Ironically number 9 can save them at this point (releasing games on multiple platforms)
By “save them” you mean make more profit for Microsoft. Xbox will still be a dying hardware platform.
You could add the naming scheme for the consoles, it just confuses customers. I know they wanted to avoid traditional numbering bc it would always be lower than their competitor, but this whole 360 then One then Series thing is confusing af. Imagine a Soccer Mom trying to figure this stuff out. I still mistakenly call the Series X the One from time to time on accident.
Don't forget about the Xbox One, Xbox One X and Xbox Series X! Good luck to Soccer moms around the world.
They did that on purpose to confuse and direct attention away from the generational numbering.
MS doesn’t like reminding people that they joined the industry after others had already been involved in gaming.
For instance, they called the xbox “360” to combat PlayStation “3” because they wanted to seem like “more” than “3”, so instead of xbox 2, they opted for xbox 360. Also this had the additional benefit of selling consoles to uninformed parents who might purchase a “360” instead of a “3” by mistake, or because they thought 360 was more than 3. Kind of a disingenuous move.
They have been continuing with their confusing naming patterns for pretty much the same reasons. Frankly, it fits with who and what they are as a brand.
I can understand their reasoning, but whoever came up with that naming scheme should be fired, bad naming schemes have killed consoles (I'm pretty sure it was the major reason for the downfall of the WiiU). They should have had unqiue names like Nintendo and Sega have had for their consoles, far less confusing for the consumer.
@FinalFantasyFanatic "They should have had unqiue names like Nintendo..."
lol, you mean:
NES, SNES
GameBoy, GameBoy Advanced, GameBoy Colour, GameBoy SP
DS, DSi, DSXL
3DS, 3DS XL, New 3DS, New 3DS XL
Wii, Wii U
Switch, Switch OLED
Phil Spencer is the worst that has happened to Xbox.
They built a respectable brand up to Xbox one. Then this guy took over and things became a joke
I didn't like either person, both people damaged their respective brands and produced worse outcomes, but Phil did save the Xbox brand from being retired by Microsoft. Although in hindsight, he should have just let it die, rather than languish in limbo like it is now.
Phil Spencer was also on the team back when 360 was around, alongside Shane Kim, Peter Moore etc. I think the damage that did the most harm was the Don Mattrick "Always Online" console (ahead of its time basically). They handed Sony and Nintendo a free-pass when that was revealed. It went downhill from there. Then the corporate machine went into full swing to try and recover. They have to a degree as a games company for the masses, and less so for the core gamer. Outside USA, the Xbox brand does not sell as well as Japanese based consoles (citation needed).
Want a decision maker. The always online and TV plans was a disaster yes, but they caught up by announcing 1st party games that gamers actually kept the hype going.. until this moron took over and introduced the PC day one release.. e all know where that ended..
I dont think they were ever a respectable brand, not since the beginning, when their goal was never to be involved and share in the gaming space. I think the OG xbox was an exception because MS as a brand was still getting its foot in and so the people behind that were people of the gaming industry.
The 360 was the brand in its prime though, everything went downhill towards the end of that generation. Its staple games like Halo, Forza and Gears are what kept the console relevant and afloat for so long.
Really good video.
I remember the days with RRoD was big news on here, N4G.
Microsoft had it turbulence number of years.
Looking at the success of Sea of Thieves despite being 6 years old, time to release Halo, Forza horizon 4 & 5 on PS5. It'll help their revenue
2 of the 4 games they did already sold really well. So it's definitely going down. Idk about halo or forza but I feel those studios they've bought in the last 5 years, their coming
I found this video painful to watch. Can someone list them out?
Top 10 for me from are:
1. 2013 reveal presentation
2. Bundling Kinect 2 with Xbox One
3. RRoD or why rushing to market with hardware is always a bad idea.
4. Buying studios only to close them.
5. Ads on the Home Screen
6. Letting Halo die.
7. Letting Geard of War die.
8. Every console name
9. Charging for Xbox Live on Xbox 360 when Sony let PS3 players play online for free.
10. Cancelling release of OG Xbox games after the Xbox 360 launched.
Microsoft recently revealed its plans to incorporate Copilot directly into video games, with Minecraft being the first showcased example.
F*** AI
"Hey Copilot, what's a good meme to prove I dislike AI".... https://giphy.com/clips/sou...
Two trillion dollar company that just can't wait to put as many people possible out of work as fast as possible.
It feels like every single thing they do is making gaming worse and destroying the industry.
....you know it takes people to program the AI.... right? It isnt like it is sentient. We haven't reach skynet level of situation or anywhere close to the matrix just yet.
That's next Thursday.
It takes a people to program the AI then that AI is used for who knows how many games eliminating countless jobs which only grows as AI is used for more and more game creation functions.
What you're saying is so ridiculously short sighted and truly larking any kind of understanding and foresight.
Why all the hate? Im actually excited about this! Always wanted this kind of immersion, and an AI companion with me all the time helping me out knowing the status of my skills/inventory/progress and giving me tips on the best approach or how to craft something specific is game changing for the industry.
Hate all you want about AI, but this is just the start and I can see the potential already. You wont be complaining in the next 5-10 years about this, but rather complain if a game hasn’t implemented it.
Yes we can't wait for the work of others to be used without the need to pay them so that MS can profit even more from the people they fire.
There is no chance I'd ever use something like this, especially if it's not part of the core game design, but a layer on top of it. It's way too much handholding. Many games already feel like busy work, because they don't let the player figure things out on their own. Having a real-time interactive guide defeats the purpose of playing the game in the first place in my opinion.
If this were to become the standard like you predict, we'll see more and more video games get away with bad design, because people will just be used to ask for help from the AI companion anyway.
Well Nintendo don't need this with some of their games these days, with invincible characters, items, easy bosses etc.. they do the hand holding built in
Im not a big xbox fan but unless someone comes up with real proof that you always have to be connected, Im not buying it.
Yeah more 720 articles -_-
Dont worry people more are incoming just take a look at the pending tap.
CAN SOMEONE PLEASE SUBMIT A PS4 ARTICLE - the PS4 needs attention too.
#Dealwithit now please.
That's because when youre the boss of this video game and entertainment shit, people wait on you. MSFT aint fazed by a stronger 360 in the ps4 with a camera and controller that define dusty. How will they utilize the ps4? Camera and controller aren't proven yet. 360 and Kinect works. Might not be mind blowing just yet but we see the potential. I started up Tiger woods Pga 14 yesterday and didnt even use the controller until I was at the dash again. And that's just 360. No company has been implementing the move into everything. 3rd party devs dont use move, but they see promise in Kinect. Like me switching madden plays with my voice. Try it, it works dam well. Next Gen isn't about power, its about who utilizes their hardware and software the best. Nintendos just fine, however, between Microsoft and Sony.. Someone's getting dealt a hurting blow. Imagine how awkward it'll be for Sony if it ships with a camera like Kinect and Microsoft ship the next Xbox with the Kinect inside it.
basically what I'm getting at is that ps4 will be a good game system for fanboys. They're the next Nintendo. They'll cater to only their fanboys and w.e woman even uses a ps4 while receiving the shitty version on 3rd party games. Its the way the dice is shakes and roll. Have fun now while you can... Its going to be a long ride
the silence of Microsoft is the worst publicity