SenjutsuSage
Banned
This is starting to look like a bad deal for everybody depending on how much MS paid.
It's definitely not a bad deal for Xbox One owners planning to buy Tomb Raider later this year. The Xbox One version gets exclusive attention from not just the dev team, but we know Microsoft are heavily involved as well. And with regards to how much Microsoft paid, it honestly may not even matter. We know it had to be something good to get Square to do something like this, and of course we know Microsoft definitely has the money to throw around.
It's great news for Xbox because Microsoft has effectively secured, for all intents and purposes, as close to a next gen console exclusive to a sequel for one of the best games of the last generation. They clearly gave the publisher some serious financial peace of mind, which means the game likely doesn't need to sell quite as much to be a profitable venture for Square Enix. And on top of that there's also a 360 version being released, and we all know there's an amazingly healthy install base on the 360. In Microsoft's most ideal and preferred scenario there would be a lot of 360 owners dying to play the next gen console version of the game that go out and upgrade to an xbox one for the holidays in order to not miss out on the next gen fun.
I think Microsoft are in a great position unless the game is a total critical bomb and literally doesn't sell at all.