Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and CFO Amy Hood discussed the performance of the Xbox business, including the forecast for the current quarter.
Firaxis veteran Jake Solomon hasn't seen mass layoffs like this in his whole 25-year career.
Gematsu writes: "Cooperative third-person shooter Helldivers II has sold 12 million units as of May 5, publisher Sony Interactive Entertainment and developer Arrowhead Game Studios announced."
And well-deserved. I'm having a ball of a time so far. Just need to change out my heavy armour, it's a murder on my stamina and sprinting.
SIE managed to find success with gaas quicker than I suspected. Arrowhead did a great job getting past that initial launch difficulty, I've been playing again recently doing mostly solo missions. Can't even get off the damn planet after completing everything, lol.
12 million is crazy, but it also paints an opposite picture to what the forums would have you believe about gaas. And it being more successful then the single player games of late also kind of proves to an executive gaas IS. what the consumer wants.
Disagree, most GAAS games are free, cheaper than or around the same price as Helldivers.
Helldivers II sold very well because of the viral campaign and word of mouth, I can't think of another game that has done numbers like this that wasn't completely free or attached to a service like GamePass/Plus Extra~Premium.
Helldivers II is an exception to the rule, not the norm.
That’s a hard coup, considering the online campaign that happens with death to ALL gaas the forums campaign. To only turn around and try to explain the hypocrisy of it?
Either people hate GaaS, they don’t hate GAaS or they hate a practice in the GaaS but they DO love GaaS. But, the online campaigns as if you paying 40 bucks for a game then willingly paid an extra 20 for cosmetics THEN you buy more cosmetics in the 40-60 dollar game that is ONLINE only that alledgely people hate.
Or you don’t hate any of those things and you just act like you do when something isn’t being made how you want it to be on initial impressions. Regardless how many disagrees happen it doesn’t change the fact there is a clear hypocritical practice happening here when we discuss what is an “acceptable” game (swearing single player is the way with robust content) then buying the game that you swear is the death of gaming (gaas that have always online requirement, you don’t “own” the game, tied to online restrictions and isn’t truly a complete game as they continue to add content that could arguably be done day 1)
But go ahead try to make it seem like 12 million people didn’t just convince executives they want this over say the 3-4 million that support FF7R/FF16 or even the million or 2 that bought stellarblade or RoR.
You can’t convince people that live service games aren’t the future after they are supported more then the single player experience.
With Arkane Austin no more and Lyon living for who knows how long, the superb Dishonored is in serious danger; Microsoft cannot be trusted.
I love the Dishonored series so much and really want Dishonored 3. Microsoft better not screw this up.
I mean, I think the fans will probably kill Arkane Lyon by cooking up reasons to hate whatever they do next without playing it. I've never seen a game so artificially disliked as Deathloop.
Lol, why don't we just say, we are worried about all studios owned by MS now. They will keep closing studios until they have none left ...🙄
Just merge them all into a single studio, have it churn out a single Call of Duty every year and call it a day, lol.
I think it's becoming clear based on matt bootys comments there's no future for any IP that can't sell above 10 million within the launch window. But is also a small game that gives them prestige
/S it's beyond a joke right now
“Never Been More Excited" About Games Lineup“
It’s like a broken record. Put up or shut up.
'as well as mobile, where we now, have over 200 million monthly active users alone, inclusive of Activision Blizzard King'
There's your context. They'll probably start including every playstation\switch player playing an activision game next, if they haven't already in that figure.
Lot of emphasis on cloud streaming, didn't see any call outs on the console business.
However he did reiterate that the games covered earlier this year are slated for Xbox and not PlayStation.
Really curious on whether any of the rumors re: physical games, console future, and exclusives are true - if they are he's not signalling too much at this point.
This is how they'll justify their bonuses, I guess. Maybe it's just me, but this flex after layoffs really rubs me the wrong way.
I get that this is a financial earnings call, but it was less than a week ago we were talking about people losng their jobs. Just comes across as distasteful.
Honestly, I'd like to see some product boycotting, but if 2023's Call of Duty can still be profitable despite all of the issues, I don't have much hope.
There will always be a contingent of fans that, regardless of what happens to the workers, will embrace the products as Game Pass Day One perks. Even so, you always want to hope there's a come to Jesus moment.